married couple in same residency

[Rocco Reed]

i was hoping there may be some Program Directors or Chief Residents who could weigh in on this. Is it a conflict of interest to have a married couple in the same rotation where one is directly supervising the other on a daily basis like during the floor months? how do your programs handle this?

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[brats800]

This happened at our residency several years before I started. To answer your questions:
1) Yes, I would view it as conflict of interest to have a senior resident be supervising their spouse as a junior resident, especially if there are other junior residents on the service. It probably doesn't matter if both residents are on, for instance, a derm rotation (where both residents function similarly and do not evaluate eachother).
2) If your program is large enough, this could easily be avoided by just not scheduling the spouses on service at the same time.
3) Our program had viewed it as a different issue when the spouse (senior and junior resident) were on call together. We only had 2 residents (a junior and senior resident) on each night so nobody could play favorites.

 

[VenturaResident]

i was hoping there may be some Program Directors or Chief Residents who could weigh in on this. Is it a conflict of interest to have a married couple in the same rotation where one is directly supervising the other on a daily basis like during the floor months? how do your programs handle this?

I'm having a hard time understanding how this would be a conflict of interest. Can you explain more? The role of the senior resident includes teaching, guiding, helping, giving feedback, and supervising the work of a less-experienced junior resident. The senior resident has no role in decisions about salary, promotion, hiring/firing, giving grades on tests, etc. I'm not certain what brats800 is referring to regarding "playing favorites" - do you mean giving unfair feedback or dividing up work unequally? If that's an issue maybe you should reconsider the overall ethical baseline of the residency you are in or are considering. Seriously. Because that is a much bigger problem than people who are dating/married. Currently we have two residents who are married to each other - one is a junior resident and one is a senior resident, and there have been residents in the past who are married, and other current residents who are dating each other. I've overheard the two who are here give each other feedback about ways to improve and feel confident that the senior resident absolutely could supervise the junior with no conflicts of interest. I hope for you that that would also be the case at your program.

 

[brats800]

I'm not certain what brats800 is referring to regarding "playing favorites" - do you mean giving unfair feedback or dividing up work unequally? If that's an issue maybe you should reconsider the overall ethical baseline of the residency you are in or are considering. Seriously. Because that is a much bigger problem than people who are dating/married.

There are many times that a senior resident / chief resident can be slightly unfair. Even if they are NOT being unfair and are doing their best to be fair, having a spouse who is a junior resident is just walking on thin ice. You don't have to be unfair to be perceived as unfair. I recall, when I made our call schedule, having residents complain that their call schedule or rotation schedule was much harder than another resident schedule (until they went and did a tally and found that things were actually quite even). I by no means am saying that someone will be easier on their spouse, but they will likely be under close scrutiny. Why risk it if it can be avoided (different rotations, etc)?

 

[VenturaResident]

Agreed that people could feel that call schedules are unfair, despite all attempts to make them fair. At our program, the senior resident on a rotation doesn't make the call schedule (currently made by chief residents, soon to be made by med ed with chief supervision), so I still don't see that issue coming up for us.

 

[NRAI2001]

You guys mainly mentioned situations where one person out of the couple would be senior to the other.... what about those couples who are applying together for the same year for the same residency? In that case there would be no situation where one would be senior to the other?? I m currently applying to FM with my wife and it seems that many of the larger FM programs (8+ residents per year) are pretty resceptive to the idea... some have even said that its a "positive" or a "plus" in their eyes??? It was only brought up to be a concern at some of the smaller programs (4-5 residents) and those programs on the East Coast...??

 

[Rocco Reed]

I don't think it's a problem having a married couple in the same residency. I also think it's a positive. But I do think situations can occur in certain rotations where a conflict of interest can occur

 

[samcutchn]

I think there would be a conflict of interest. It would be better if they would have different residency.

 

[VenusinFurs]

I think there would be a conflict of interest. It would be better if they would have different residency.

Definitely not inherently true, and definitely not a practical solution in a lot of cases. A lot of the best FM residencies are in the middle of nowhere and for spouses to stay together they have to go to the same residency. The way my residency is structured, the only way there could be a conflict of interest is if the senior resident gave unfairly good or unfairly bad feedback to their junior spouse, and that could be avoided by making sure they were never on the same rotations, and that would be a minor disadvantage at best. Most fellowships and jobs seem to be looking for letters from attendings, so I don't think one eval from one other resident is going to significantly alter your life trajectory.

Now on the other hand, could working with your spouse potentially create a bad work environment if, say, you were having a horrible fight? Maybe.