D.O. Internships/Residencies

[jrdn1284]

Hello,

I am currently a in a health care professional school, considering applying for DO/Med School. I am somewhat ignorant to the internship/residency requirements/advantages though.

My focus post-grad is private family practice, therefore my choice for internship/residency would be family practice or a traditional rotating internship i imagine.

My understanding is that an internship is your first year and that a residency is three years total (including the first year internship).

What are the requirements for licensure/practice and advantages/disadvantages with insurance allowances/reimbursement? Are you allowed to only complete the internship and then move on to licensed practice or are you required (and/or have more insurance advantages) to completing the full three year residency?

Also what, in general, is a med students student loan debt coming out of graduation?

Thanks for the info!

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[JaggerPlate]

Hello,

I am currently a in a health care professional school, considering applying for DO/Med School. I am somewhat ignorant to the internship/residency requirements/advantages though.

DO school = medical school. It's not attending a DO school OR attending medical school ... it's simply attending medical school.

My focus post-grad is private family practice, therefore my choice for internship/residency would be family practice or a traditional rotating internship i imagine.

These questions should be addressed somewhere other than a pre-med board, but I will give them a shot. No problem landing FP residency as a DO, almost positive FP residencies are 3 years and you match directly so the 'internship' year is included ... unless you want to practice in one of the 5 states (someone else will answer better)

What are the requirements for licensure/practice and advantages/disadvantages with insurance allowances/reimbursement? Are you allowed to only complete the internship and then move on to licensed practice or are you required (and/or have more insurance advantages) to completing the full three year residency?

you need a license to practice medicine and you need to be board eligable/board certified in FP to run an FP practice. What do you mean the advantages/disadvantages of insurance companies?? Advtages: you get paid money ... disadvantages: unless you are trying to run a cash only FP practice, you're pretty much a slave to these and their crappy reimbursements. Technically, I think you can moonlight in like a general clinic or something with just your license after your first year ... but you can't call yourself a FP guy until you're done with residency.

Also what, in general, is a med students student loan debt coming out of graduation?

Terrible?? 200-250k I guess. You really should ask residents/med students.

 

[DrMidlife]

There are 3 or 4 states in the US that allow you to practice medicine with just one year of internship. The rest of the states require a full residency, such as a family practice residency. You can find a state's licensing requirements (make sure to look for a board of osteopathic licensing, if one exists, not just the "medical" board) on state gov't websites.

If you're sure you only care to practice in one of those 3 or 4 states that only require internship, the traditional rotating internship or a transitional year internship qualifies.

If you do a full residency in family practice in a DO post-graduate program, usually this includes credit for the first-year traditional rotating internship. There are also military and "MD" (ACGME) residencies, which combined with additional per-state licensing requirements, make matters very, very complicated. You shouldn't worry about this part until AFTER you decide you want to be a doctor or not.

Average US med student debt is currently around $150k, which grows while you're in residency (deferring payments). Note that this averages in all the folks who are on full military scholarship, and/or who accumulate no debt (due to parental contribution or school scholarship), and/or who go to extremely cheap state-supported public schools. If you go to a private school and pay out-of-state tuition, you should assume you're looking at $300k debt after med school, which grows to about $450k after residency.

Best of luck to you.

 

[DrMom]

There actually are a significant # of states that allow you to practice independently with an internship or completion of 2 years of residency (this is how residents manage to moonlight). Thing is, this SEVERELY limits your future practice. Many if not most hospitals and insurance companies require being board certified (or at least eligible to take a board cert exam). If you want to do anything other than urgent care, you need to finish a residency in something.

 

[DrMidlife]

Ah, ok I looked into this some more, such as on www.fsmb.org. Indeed the majority of US states require a minimum of one year of post-grad training (aka a one year internship). The position of "GMO" in the military (general medical officer?), which you're likely to fill for a number of years before residency if you take a military scholarship, requires just one year of residency.

What I'd look for, if I'm trying to make a case that I can get away with not doing residency, is job listings that DON'T require board certification. You don't get board certified without a residency. I would expect that the jobs are limited to reservation medicine, military base clinics and similar.