Call at an Interventional Oncology Center

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futureSuperStar

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What would a call schedule look like as an attending or fellow at a center that does strictly interventional oncology? I'm thinking places like MD Anderson or Memorial Sloan Kettering. Would you be taking general IR call? Or would be responding to mostly to random IR related emergencies among your cancer patients? What kinds of things would you be called in for over the weekend/night?
 
What would a call schedule look like as an attending or fellow at a center that does strictly interventional oncology? I'm thinking places like MD Anderson or Memorial Sloan Kettering. Would you be taking general IR call? Or would be responding to mostly to random IR related emergencies among your cancer patients? What kinds of things would you be called in for over the weekend/night?
drains and angiography/embolizations mostly
 
One of my good friends is an IR attending at MSK. They schedule a bunch of ports on the weekend in addition to hospital call cases, which mainly consist of drains (abscesses, biliary), embolizations, nephrostomies, etc. All inpatients who've had a procedure like TACE or have a drain get rounded on by the NP/IR fellow, as well as any weekend stat consults. It's similar to taking call at any other academic hospital, with the exception that they rarely or even never do TIPS or uterine artery embolizations (not that common in their patient population). No dialysis intervention nor trauma population either, though they can get some funky bleeds because of cancer or treatment eroding arteries and such. And obviously no PAD.

Their IR staff is so large that each individual only has to take weekend call several times a year. But it can get pretty busy.
 
What would a call schedule look like as an attending or fellow at a center that does strictly interventional oncology? I'm thinking places like MD Anderson or Memorial Sloan Kettering. Would you be taking general IR call? Or would be responding to mostly to random IR related emergencies among your cancer patients? What kinds of things would you be called in for over the weekend/night?


If you're really concerned about call schedule, don't do IR.