Are there any "lifestyle" specialties left?

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8 hrs? lol 7 hours seems like the mean nowadays :p

7 hours is sleeping in. You'll learn to function fine on 4-5 for prolonged periods when you need to.

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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".

I still believe you can find balance working a 60 hr week.

You all are lucky that medicine has entered the "lifestyle" era. There was a time when physicians had to work twice as much as they do now. I'm glad those days are gone too, but I also think that physicians have a high level of responsibility and asking to work in the top 10 percentile of work hours is appropriate considering you're paid in the top 10 percentile. Most individuals who have important jobs in the US are working more than 50 hours per week.

As for the sleeping topic, I wouldn't drop from 6.5-7 hours of sleep. It's good for your health and it's not a weakness. I think we're moving the wrong way when we begin to compromise our health for better medical results.
 
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.

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. :D
 
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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.

Slap of the female Canis lupus familiaris bestowed upon all naysayers.
 
7 hours is sleeping in. You'll learn to function fine on 4-5 for prolonged periods when you need to.
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.

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.
Fixed.
 
Operating on the eye is operating on the brain. :D

Heh, operating on the retina or optic nerve is operating on the brain. Everything else is just eye :)

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.

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.
 
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).
 
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.
 
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?
 
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 :p

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)
 

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.
 
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. :D

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.
 
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shnurek, you sold me ... are there any optometry schools that take med school transfers for credits? LOL
 
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrNxxxxy7d-v_10[/YOUTUBE]
FMxqv.gif
 
Radiology is still a lifestyle specialty in the sense that we still have plenty of time off and we arent tied to our pagers when we are off. You will work like a dog when you are on though. Never regretted going into rads for a second. I get paid well and still have plenty of time to enjoy it.
 
Precisely.

I accept your apology.
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.
 
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:p

For the record i do agree that ODs are doctors, not physicians
 
Dam man whats with the intense OD hate lol im not an OD, but aint got to be so blunt:p

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.

memes-are-you-angered-my-brother.jpg
 
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.

Eh, dude's got a chip on his shoulder. Ignore him if it bugs you that much.

Back to the topic at hand...
 
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.

Oh boy, I'm glad that those folks were from new york STATE and not NYC. That changes everything!! :oops:

I actually did mean that post to be a joke. Of course ODs have more value than just checking prescriptions. However, based on your comments, I'm reassessing my feelings about ODs. IMO, ODs should do simpler procedures at a lower cost if it's cost effective and leads to the same patient outcomes. MDs are responsible for advancing and improving the field... not just picking up the s*** that is left behind after we pioneer something new... We'll see if ODs can actually do these easy procedures... The fact is ODs like Shunrek will never do all that ophthalmology has to offer.

Look kid, that salary data is from the AGMA salary survey. It's the most reputable source for physician compensation and is far more reputable than your random bar graphs from ten random people. Sorry you don't understand. It's okay though since you have a girlfriend. That makes you chill and a cool guy.

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.
 
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.

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...
 
-Gland obstructions by epilation or even excision and conduct laser eye surgery in 2 states.

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.)
 
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.
 
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.

I agree with you, jack. It seems a little narcissistic to me.
 
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...

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 agree with you, jack. It seems a little narcissistic to me.

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.
 
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.

Kindergarten teacher work more than 40 hours? o_O
 
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.

Yeah, my approach to life has been terrible so far. I'm glad that I have Law2Doc telling me I need to work harder to be better at what I do :p. Some residencies actually don't have you working 80hrs/wk like IM/GS with no time left to read anything beyond quick uptodate checks. You work 50-60hrs/wk and then you spend a lot more free time reading/studying in fields like derm or rads. That's not part of the work day but I'm pretty sure it helps make you "great at what you do." People in rad onc work like 7-4 M-F. I hear they're not super stupid but obviously not as smart as the IM folks who spend a fourth of their time battling insurance for payment lol

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.
 
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.

Oh, I understand you're talented and extremely intelligent. Like I said, I'm interested to see how this plays out over a career (not yours specifically, there are many like you). It appears talent can get you pretty far in medicine, but I know that hard work and dedication will come into play at some point.


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.

Interesting.
 
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I'm sorry, I didn't mean that to be a statement about myself. That came across way too arrogant. I'm just saying that's the formula medical schools and residencies use to pick students. Everyone knows it's this simple too, provided you have basic interviewing skills.

I bet those people are very successful because they pick careers that allow them to be happy. Your work will suffer when you're over stressed and miserable. I don't mind reading stuff that expands my knowledge 20-30hrs/week at home and then being at the hospital for 40. That's very different than being at the hospital for 60-80hrs.
 
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 &quot;great at what you do.&quot; 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.
 
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.
 
I don't think I ever used the word &quot; importance&quot;, 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.

Two of the physicians I shadowed worked less than 40 hours a week on average (both internists), and another (in family practice) worked about 40-50 hours a week. I never shadowed a physician in specialized medicine, but I would hesitate to generalize that everyone in the medical profession has to work a certain amount of hours for some reason. (Notice my experience is with three physicians so take it for what it's worth).I do tend to agree that physicians don't simply punch the time clock, and are invested in their careers and their patients. And I do think it's clear that physicians work more hours per week on average. But as with all tendencies, this is just an average and not true of every physician.
 
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 really don't know what you are specifically talking about. Where I live there is a clinic that employes hundreds of docs from all specialties and they all work exactly however many hours they want to. They set their own schedules. I really don't see why I couldn't just join a clinic like this and set my hours to 35/wk + ~5hrs of journal reading a week + ~5 hrs of research and not be considered anything less then a great doc. Sure there is a pay cut but that doesn't really bother me much. I could still contribute to the furthering of the profession and stay relevant to medical advances. I look at it as I am making the sacrifices now so I can live well later. I'm not lazy, just focused on other things besides medicine.
 
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.

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.
 
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.
 
Dam man whats with the intense OD hate lol im not an OD, but aint got to be so blunt:p

For the record i do agree that ODs are doctors, not physicians

There was not a single shot at ODs in my statement. It was Shruneks who go around telling people that they're physicians. That's all fine and dandy and I guess he can justify it by showing that google doc he uploaded. But it gets dangerous in many contexts like the hospital where anywho who is a "physician" is expected to help with a code. Happens all the time in the hospital where I worked that they banned long white coats unless you were a DO/MD. Cause if they saw someone running for a code in a white coat, you'd be expected to run point until a higher up gets there. It was real awkward when the RD in a white coat decided that they wanted to check out a code and got to the bed.
 
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.

Because you enjoy trolling the MD and Ophtho (<-- notice the spelling, please no complaints) forums and post about why you believe ODs are better in an attempt to stir the pot? Why do you care what we discuss other than to prove yourself and that you fit in? Ever see an MD go to optometry forums and post data about why they're superior? Back in the day, did you ever see Windows take shots at Macintosh? Ever see a Mercedes commercial take shots at Audi? No, because those who are superior don't feel the need to put others down while those lower on the hierarchy have to go out and make ads to show they belong. Major inferiority complex going 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.

Proper grammar please?
 
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.)

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?
 
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.

I agree with your sentiments. I also don't think your approach is lazy.

I agree we all need balance, and at the same time I think we need to realize we have a responsibility to take care of patients. Sometimes, you will need to decide between helping a colleague or patient by working over 40 hours per week. What will you do? Always say no? If a patient needed an emergent operation, would you just say "I'm over 40 hours this week, someone else can do it." Imagine the days of being a physician in a small town, when a patient needed a delivery overnight, do you just ignore their call for help if you've exceeded your weekly work requirement?

So yes, we need balance, we need time with friends, family and hobbies. Yet is asking for a 10 hour day 6 days a week excessive? That's 14 hours each day where you don't work and a 24 hour day off each week. Can you imagine when doctors worked 100 hours per week? They did a highly demanding activity 40 hours over what I'm advocating. If they could work 40 more hours, I'm sure we could all figure out how to fit in family, friends and recreation in that huge chunk of time.

This profession has a lot of responsibility in it and being good is important. I think we should try to work as much as we can while still retaining balance. Trying to work as little as possible for maximum profit seems doesn't seem good for the patients.
 
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.
 
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.

This is very true. There needs to be a fundamental understanding of anatomy and physiology before one can learn pharmacology and pathophysiology. Perhaps the first step would be to emulate European educational systems where physician education happens earlier (MD by age 21) and residency is a bit longer but this argument would lead me to my old argument where I started going into neuroscience and the plasticity of the brain at different ages. I just heard that foreign trained doctors actually kill a lesser percentage of their patients than US trained doctors, just something anecdotal I read on SDN.

I just am sometimes shocked at how much one high school educated technician that I work with knows. He learned it all by apprenticeship just like people learned back in the day and not by staring at books for 16 hours a day or more for many, many years. Our office manager stated that he knows more than optometrists coming out fresh from their training and a lot of optometrists are very knowledgeable about refractive surgery because a great majority of our patients inquire about that procedure.

The eye is a relatively isolated organ (blood-retina-barrier) and the ophthalmologist that works in our practice basically just does LASIK/PRK while the technician consults the patients, refracts them (which is better 1 or 2) and then tells them if they are good candidates or not. Of course a systemic disease like Sjogren's syndrome for example can affect the tear film integrity and would be contraindicative for refractive surgery so all systemic disease with ocular manifestations are taught in optometry school for example and should be taught for any eye care practitioner obviously. What I'm saying is to trim down medical school as many others have suggested and have it focus on only the specialty you want to do. That is basically what optometry school is. I'm not saying it is better than medical school right now because our license to practice is limited but in a lot of states we can truly be "eye doctors" because we can prescribe basically anything we want to as long as it is indicated for the eye.

I am just saying that this is the educational trend that is happening and medical colleges can adapt or continue to lose their monopoly on medicine. And the fiscal stress that the recession has caused only helped accelerate this trend.
 
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