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8 hrs? lol 7 hours seems like the mean nowadays
7 hours is sleeping in. You'll learn to function fine on 4-5 for prolonged periods when you need to.
8 hrs? lol 7 hours seems like the mean nowadays
insightful post... 6 hours is certainly much more doable on the family front.
However, my post was simply in response to the hypothetical "it is not hard to balance everything while working 12 hours per day for 5 days a week".
Sleep 6 hours a non call night, not 8. Brush your teeth in the shower and floss while on the can. Wear scrubs so you don't waste time doing laundry. Skip the gym one day a week and use the stairs instead of the elevator. Now you have balance.
Except that not all physicians work long hours. You can happily work in derm, ophtho, rads, anesthesia, rad onc, path, EM, family med, allergy, psych, sleep med with a <50hr work week, if you want. It's BS when people say a ">60 hr work week" is normal. It's not. It leads to burnout.
I can't, and I'm two years into a surgical residency. Four hours one night is going to warrant a significant nap or an early bed time the next night.7 hours is sleeping in. You'll learn to function fine on 4-5 for prolonged periods when you need to.
Fixed.Except that not all physicians work long hours. You can happily work in derm, ophtha, rads, anesthesia, rad onc, path, EM, family med, allergy, psych, sleep med with a <50hr work week, if you want. It's BS when people say a ">60 hr work week" is normal. It's not. It leads to burnout.
Operating on the eye is operating on the brain.
I hate you for making me post this data to refute your nonsensical claims. You are too ignorant to realize your data doesn't make any sense. The data you made those graphs with have n=10-15 and are from a survey of NYC residents. You are generalizing this ridiculous sample to a field with thousands of professionals? ARE YOU KIDDING? Clearly, EBM is not taught in OD school based on my sample of n=Sh'rek.
The number of ophthalmology spots is increasing and the salaries are nowhere near as low as you mention. They are on par with the highest surgical subspecialities (retina and occuloplastics can rival spine surgery). The mean is 376k according to 2010 AGMA survey data (see attached).
Get over it. No one cares about your inaccurate BS charts/graphs/figures/calculus problems. ODs check your vision and fit you for contacts. MDs treat medical and surgical problems of the eye.
Heh, operating on the retina or optic nerve is operating on the brain. Everything else is just eye
Its not NYC residents its New York State residents. But in any case, you are correct that ophthalmology spots are slowly increasing because of DO spots. But in the past there were 600 or so ophtho spots now there are only 460 or so.
I don't know where you got that snippet from it is unsourced. Clearly they don't teach you citing your sources in Med School.
http://www.medscape.com/features/slideshow/compensation/2011/ophthalmology
Median 2010 compensation for ophthalmologists, $248,500
Now this includes specialists such as retina and oculoplastics as you mentioned. Retina just got slashed in the beginning of last year. Intravitreal injections down 25%, OCT scans down 50-75% (I know this since I worked for a retina fellowship surgeon) so wait for more accurate numbers to come out. Also many ophthalmologists work 40-70 hours a week so again if you base it on a 40 hour work week it comes out to around $200,000 so in the end they do make on average twice as much as optometrists.
Also, one more thing. You are quick to judge what optometrists can do like generalize that MDs treat you for medical eye issues. Well here is news to you chief. We get on Medicare and all major insurances to treat MEDICAL issues and we do and will get reimbursed for them the same as ophthalmologists. This is because of the recent Harkin Amendment that will be in full effect in 2014. We are not yet on par in compensation with Medicaid but we are actively working on this issue.
We can diagnose any eye disease in every state.
We can treat:
-Glaucoma in 49 states.
-Dry eye, foreign bodies in the cornea/conjunctiva, lacrimal duct issues, eye infections in all states.
-Gland obstructions by epilation or even excision and conduct laser eye surgery in 2 states.
-We can prescribe oral therapeutic medications in 47 states, narcotic oral medications in 43 states, perform eye injections in 13 states and use topical diagnostic/therapeutic medications in all 50 states.
-And much more which I do not know off the top of my head.
So please don't just say, oooo optometrists check your vision and fit you for contacts. That is a gross generalization.
PS - Nobody MADE you reply. I hate people like you that blame others for their own actions.
Just because you can, doesn't mean you should. Go back to the mid-level forums. No one likes you. Of course OD's do more than fit people for glasses. His post was tongue in cheek, but it obviously went over your head (not surprisingly).
ODs are not mid-levels in every situation. We are physicians on Medicare and physicians based on the Joint Committee that accredits most hospitals in the United States. And I highly doubt his post was tongue in cheek as he made a whole thread to vote to ban me because he wants to censor me.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physician#North_America
Doctor: Yes
Physician: No
PS Why do you hang out on the allo and ophtho forums so much, even giving Ophtho residents advice or answering clinical questions. Do you enjoy the art of Troll?
Oh, very much so
Doctor: Yes
Physician: Some cases:
1) (https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&...bK3fku&sig=AHIEtbTxsXxbU0EVt3Lm5HyK1vIWI7M0Rg)
2) (https://www.cms.gov/Medicare/Qualit...wnloads//Eligible_Professionals03-08-2011.pdf)
I would have to disagree with the last phrase... Having to brush your teeth in the shower and floss while taking a **** just to save 5-8 minutes sounds like the antithesis of a "balanced" life to me.
Fixed.
People always cite 8 hours of sleep - you won't get that. Get used to it, and its probably not needed. 6 is what you should aim for as a doc, you adjust.
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrNxxxxy7d-v_10[/YOUTUBE]
I'm not apologizing. You're just rationalizing how your misspelling is okay, but everyone else's is wrong. I really don't care how some spells it, but I'm not going around telling them that they're dolts like you are.Precisely.
I accept your apology.
Yay two examples. You seem like the type to walk around the hospital and introduce yourself as the physician. Then when someone codes, you'll feel real physician like when the other dudes in the white coats run past you.
Whether ophthos should perform refractive/any surgery will be revised as more outcome data comes out. It's like CRNAs, 90% of the time everything is fine, no one notices. When you break a corneal flap 10% of the time, that's when you'll have issues.
Dam man whats with the intense OD hate lol im not an OD, but aint got to be so blunt
For the record i do agree that ODs are doctors, not physicians
It's not intense OD hate, it's intense Shnurek hate.
I really wish that petition to have him banned would've had the chance to gain some momentum before it was locked.
It's not intense OD hate, it's intense Shnurek hate.
I really wish that petition to have him banned would've had the chance to gain some momentum before it was locked.
Its not NYC residents its New York State residents. But in any case, you are correct that ophthalmology spots are slowly increasing because of DO spots. But in the past there were 600 or so ophtho spots now there are only 460 or so.
I don't know where you got that snippet from it is unsourced. Clearly they don't teach you citing your sources in Med School.
http://www.medscape.com/features/slideshow/compensation/2011/ophthalmology
Median 2010 compensation for ophthalmologists, $248,500
Now this includes specialists such as retina and oculoplastics as you mentioned. Retina just got slashed in the beginning of last year. Intravitreal injections down 25%, OCT scans down 50-75% (I know this since I worked for a retina fellowship surgeon) so wait for more accurate numbers to come out. Also many ophthalmologists work 40-70 hours a week so again if you base it on a 40 hour work week it comes out to around $200,000 so in the end they do make on average twice as much as optometrists.
Also, one more thing. You are quick to judge what optometrists can do like generalize that MDs treat you for medical eye issues. Well here is news to you chief. We get on Medicare and all major insurances to treat MEDICAL issues and we do and will get reimbursed for them the same as ophthalmologists. This is because of the recent Harkin Amendment that will be in full effect in 2014. We are not yet on par in compensation with Medicaid but we are actively working on this issue.
We can diagnose any eye disease in every state.
We can treat:
-Glaucoma in 49 states.
-Dry eye, foreign bodies in the cornea/conjunctiva, lacrimal duct issues, eye infections in all states.
-Gland obstructions by epilation or even excision and conduct laser eye surgery in 2 states.
-We can prescribe oral therapeutic medications in 47 states, narcotic oral medications in 43 states, perform eye injections in 13 states and use topical diagnostic/therapeutic medications in all 50 states.
-And much more which I do not know off the top of my head.
So please don't just say, oooo optometrists check your vision and fit you for contacts. That is a gross generalization.
PS - Nobody MADE you reply. I hate people like you that blame others for their own actions.
I'm just floating a way to fit everything in, tongue in cheek. It's not a new concept. There's a musical from the early 50s called Pajama Game which also goofed on this kind of multitasking, featuring an assembly line foreman who went to sleep in his clothes and shaved in bed to save time.
But more seriously, you have to pick what's important to you, and fit it into your schedule, and pare down everything else, including sleep, if you want both "balance" and an intense career. And learn to multitask better to fit more things into a finite day. There are certain immovable objects on your schedule, work being the main one. 5-6 hours of sleep on non call nights is immovable, the rest is personally negotiable. Exercise can be squeezed in wherever -- you might not get an hour a day, but maybe you can do something twice as intense fewer times a week. Professional weightlifters alternate between cycles where they do daily multiple reps and weeks where they just do 1-2 all out maximum weight lifts and after 20 minutes need a few days to recover -- that can work in residency where your availability is irregular. It's about quality time rather than quantity.
Some people have the energetic, let's try to do everything personality that allows them to have balance and squeeze a ton into each day. Most people have to make judicious cuts if they want to be a professional. That's just the way it is. If you are "lazy", there simply isn't a place for you at the physician table. There are tons of other ways to earn a living that involve less work, but nobody is going to hand those to you either -- you have to bring an idea or a talent to the table.
The notion that folks want to not work too hard and receive lots of money is not new, but in the thousands of years since this "ideal" has existed, nobody has come up with a better solution than to marry rich, inherit from rich ancestors, be remarkably attractive, or be born with unique natural abilities in things folks are willing to pay money to see. For everyone else, hard hard work and long hours are the requirement. And medicine is among the longer houred jobs with the longer training curve out there. Anyone who selects this path pretty much selected a path that involves bad hours and hard work. No point whining that it's not a 40-50 hour a week job or complaining that it lacks balance. If you want balance go manage a Walmart. You'll have a house and kids and time to mow the lawn.
-Gland obstructions by epilation or even excision and conduct laser eye surgery in 2 states.
Medicine is full of self-sacrificing folks who do amazing work for their patients. Those people are in rads, ophtho and derm too. I just don't think it's wrong if people do medicine and realize they can't give up that much. It's just fine if they still are great at what they do but work less. It's not a crime to work 50hrs/wk... or even, *gasp*, 40hrs a week...
How did you guys sell admissions committees and yourself on medicine with a desire to work only 40 hour weeks? You want to work less than a kindergarten teacher in a career where people's lives are at risk if you do your job poorly. I don't think this was ever meant to be an easy, lazy, get rich in minimal hours career.
I'll be interested to see how careers work out for people with your philosophy. I'm not hoping anyone fails, I'm just interested to see how that will work in medicine.
Medicine is full of self-sacrificing folks who do amazing work for their patients. Those people are in rads, ophtho and derm too. I just don't think it's wrong if people do medicine and realize they can't give up that much. It's just fine if they still are great at what they do but work less. It's not a crime to work 50hrs/wk... or even, *gasp*, 40hrs a week...
I agree with you, jack. It seems a little narcissistic to me.
How did you guys sell admissions committees and yourself on medicine with a desire to work only 40 hour weeks? You want to work less than a kindergarten teacher in a career where people's lives are at risk if you do your job poorly. I don't think this was ever meant to be an easy, lazy, get rich in minimal hours career.
I'll be interested to see how careers work out for people with your philosophy. I'm not hoping anyone fails, I'm just interested to see how that will work in medicine.
It's not a crime, it's just not realistic to go into a highly demanding profession and expect to work 40 hours a week and be "great at what you do." it's stupid to expect to shoehorn a long houred profession into your own notion of what hours should be instead of select a career that actually fits those dimensions. Anyway this debate is getting pointless. Obviously you have it all figured out.
How did you guys sell admissions committees and yourself on medicine with a desire to work only 40 hour weeks? You want to work less than a kindergarten teacher in a career where people's lives are at risk if you do your job poorly. I don't think this was ever meant to be an easy, lazy, get rich in minimal hours career.
I'll be interested to see how careers work out for people with your philosophy. I'm not hoping anyone fails, I'm just interested to see how that will work in medicine.
High test scores + Impressing research PIs --> Elite Medical School
Also... High Step 1 + Prestigious Med School + Clinical Grades + Publications --> Elite, Selective Residency
No one ever asked me how many hours I wanted to work.
I'm not sure narcissism is the right word. This is part of the "entitlement" syndrome that plagues the current generation. Was featured on 60 minutes about 5 years ago. It's an attitude that doesn't serve folks well, particularly in a tight economy. It's actually part of the reason nontrads are being welcomed into the profession in higher numbers, because employers find folks who've actually had a career track record have more realistic career expectations.
It's not a crime, it's just not realistic to go into a highly demanding profession and expect to work 40 hours a week and be "great at what you do." it's stupid to expect to shoehorn a long houred profession into your own notion of what hours should be instead of select a career that actually fits those dimensions. Anyway this debate is getting pointless. Obviously you have it all figured out.
What's the connection between hours worked in a job and the importance of a job? If I sweep streets am I only allowed to work part time? If I'm a kindergarten teacher I have to work 80 hours a week? I don't get it.
I don't think I ever used the word " importance", and I don't think that's the right word, because I certainly wasn't putting value judgments on careers, just describing expectations in medicine. Nor was I the one to reference kindergarten teachers. I said medicine is a highly demanding and long houred profession, which it is, but that hey, that if that's not for you, they are always hiring at Walmart. Not saying Walmart isn't important, just saying the hours are regular, you can live for the quitting bell, and you are never going to wake up in the middle of the night worrying that you overlooked something like you will as a resident. There are jobs that by necessity become an all consuming cornerstone and jealous mistress in your life, and those that won't. Medicine is in the former group, I'm afraid, even in most of the lifestyle fields. Hours keep going up and reimbursements keep going down. An enormous number of uninsured and underserved folks are about to be dumped into the system without any additional funding, which to me suggests that the next round of doctors are going to be working even harder just to kerp pace with the prior year. Which is fine if you are prepared for it, but not so fine if you have some unrealistic expectation of being a 9-5 worker. But hey, whatever, you guys go ahead and believe what you want and see if it works out the way you expect. I'm happy for you (us) if I'm wrong.
It's not a crime, it's just not realistic to go into a highly demanding profession and expect to work 40 hours a week and be "great at what you do." it's stupid to expect to shoehorn a long houred profession into your own notion of what hours should be instead of select a career that actually fits those dimensions. Anyway this debate is getting pointless. Obviously you have it all figured out.
I'm so sorry that your parents don't love you because you are an OD and not an MD. I bet it sucks being an Indian (maybe Asian? who went to Stuyvesant in NYC) whose parents love you not as much because you couldn't get into medical school. That sucks bro. I wish we could help you but all your erroneous posts won't rectify your inadequacies. As someone firmly in the elite Ivory Tower, I can assure you that chips on your shoulder exist even at the highest levels. Doesn't mean you need to be a douche and antagonist people like this. I feel bad for you. Your posts are pathetic.
Dam man whats with the intense OD hate lol im not an OD, but aint got to be so blunt
For the record i do agree that ODs are doctors, not physicians
Don't worry my parents are not tiger parents and I am not Indian nor Asian. Pointing out my antagonism and calling me a douche is considered being antagonistic. I enjoy your hypocrisy.
I might one day apply to medical school but currently I love what I do so we'll see how the career goes. I don't feel inadequate because I never took the MCAT nor did I apply. Why does everyone assume I have a chip on my shoulder or that I feel inadequate or better yet, just become infuriated when I educate them about the scope of practice of optometry? Is it a defense mechanism? Accept the facts and move on.
Don't worry my parents are not tiger parents and I am not Indian nor Asian. Pointing out my antagonism and calling me a douche is considered being antagonistic. I enjoy your hypocrisy.
I might one day apply to medical school but currently I love what I do so we'll see how the career goes. I don't feel inadequate because I never took the MCAT nor did I apply. Why does everyone assume I have a chip on my shoulder or that I feel inadequate or better yet, just become infuriated when I educate them about the scope of practice of optometry? Is it a defense mechanism? Accept the facts and move on.
Yeah but The American Academy of Ophthalmology is working on that. The link to donations for the surgical scope fund is in my signature. The Optometry lobbyists have been hard at work for a long time getting increased treatment privileges. Most physician organizations prefer to remain apolitical as long as possible, but finally the AAO has begun to push back. I think it's about time. Continued down this road the Optometrists would be doing vitrectomies and cataracts and blinding people by 2020 (no pun intended.)
I've been following this thread for a while and thought I'd put in my two cents.
I think what is being missed here is the difference between laziness and prioritization. There was a time in my life where working 70-80 hrs a week seemed like my obligation to myself and others because I went into this profession. But, as time has passed, I've realized that I'm really quite a bit happier when I work 40 hours a week. Why? Because I have a wife who I enjoy spending time with, and God knows she hasn't seen me as much as she should during medical school. I don't ever think I'd feel "entitled" to work as little as possible, as someone else suggested. Rather, it's just a difference of priorities, and perhaps some bitterness? I have several classmates who want to go into specialties that are notorious for long work weeks. And honestly, good for them! If I ever need emergent neurosurgery performed on a loved one or myself, I want the surgeon behind me to be someone that enjoys their work. As with many things in life, I'm just of a different variety. And part of that is historically based; my father was a physician who was an intensivist and easily worked 70 hrs most weeks...he died of cancer rather suddenly and his biggest regret was that he spent so much time working. That really shaped who I am today, and I don't want to become my father. Don't misunderstand, I highly admire what he did, and what some of you and my classmates will do in similarly demanding fields; many lives are saved at your sacrifice. But please, don't try to insinuate that the rest of us are lazy just because we have a difference of personal opinion on the matter. My desire to work 40-50 hours a week some day isn't rooted in laziness, but solely priorities that differ. If you enjoy emergent OR cases on a Saturday afternoon, good for you...we need physicians who are eager to do that. I'd rather spend the day with my wife and family.
You are fighting a losing war my friend. No one mind can learn and comprehend all the complexity of medicine. Times are changing so quickly and new innovations are coming out so often that people joke that ophthos even specialize in the left or the right eye.
I believe that it would be more efficient and beneficial to train "cataract monkeys" or other procedural/niche specialists from a young age. Imagine how skilled and efficient they would be. Of course they would know things such as basic life support (gas would do the advanced) and pharmacology (as it relates to human lens pathologies.) Now this is an exaggerated example but I used it to illustrate my point.
In the future I say that education will not be about the amount of years but about the focal nature of the education. A person would go to school to become a nurse anaesthetist and once that person wants to advance their career and pass more exams then they would become an anaesthesiology assistant and then a step later, a full anaesthesiologist.
Why should one go to school for 22 years(K-8, HS, college, med school+intern) and barely learn anything about the eye and then spend the next 3 years(ophtho residency) finally learning basically everything they need to know for the rest of their practicing career ~35 years?
You seem to not have a good understanding of how medicine works. Science builds on itself. You have to walk before you can run. You need to learn basic unit manipulation in elementary and middle school before you can learn about chemical reactions in high school. You have to learn chemical reactions before you can understand the effects of different enantimers (sp?). You need a basic understanding of science before you can go to medical school.....once youre in medical school, you need to understand anatomy and physiology before you can learn pathology and pharmacology. You need to know those subjects cold before you can start working on the body. You need to have a fundamental understanding of the body before you can learn one part of the body well.
This is really a fundamental problems with what I have seen with a lot of midlevels (please note, I am not saying ODs are midlevels, let's just not go down that road again)....They think they can just pick up on stuff by doing. They hear a friction rub and learn that friction rubs are associated with pericarditis. They know that a lot of forms of pericarditis are treated with NSAIDs. Then a patient comes in with a uremic pericarditis. They don't know the pathophys behind it and and throw some NSAIDs at the patient. Now a patient an acute kidney injury was just given a medicine that hurts the kidneys and lost an opportunity to have a complete recovery with dialysis.
Yes, I know that example is extreme. The fact of the matter is that a lot of people have this view "well, orthopods only need to know the bones, why don't they just learn that out of high school" - because they would make horrible doctors who only knew bones. Our medical education system is a little archaic and needs some revamping, but what you're talking about would lead to catastrophic failures in patient outcomes. A general surgeon who doesn't know about OB/gyn would think that ectopic pregnancies are ruptured appendices. There's significant crossover in medicine, much more than you're giving credit for. Sadly, you're not the first person I've heard make suggestions to change medical education along those lines. I hope it never comes to that, or at least I hope I am never cared for by people who train in that sort of scenario.