Do residents ever work from home?

[deleted1139416]

Ok, so obviously, not “work from home” in the sense that someone with a regular office job works from home. But my IM attending does all her charting at home after work and looks at her patients charts at home before coming to work and puts in nee orders, etc. This is because the hospital gives her remote access to the EHR. Her time in the hospital is around 4 hours per day. When she’s not there we are either pre-rounding or writing practice notes. Is this something that would ever be offered to residents?

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[Angry Birds]

Ok, so obviously, not “work from home” in the sense that someone with a regular office job works from home. But my IM attending does all her charting at home after work and looks at her patients charts at home before coming to work and puts in nee orders, etc. This is because the hospital gives her remote access to the EHR. Her time in the hospital is around 4 hours per day. When she’s not there we are either pre-rounding or writing practice notes. Is this something that would ever be offered to residents?

Haha good one

 

[24blue8]

Ok, so obviously, not “work from home” in the sense that someone with a regular office job works from home. But my IM attending does all her charting at home after work and looks at her patients charts at home before coming to work and puts in nee orders, etc. This is because the hospital gives her remote access to the EHR. Her time in the hospital is around 4 hours per day. When she’s not there we are either pre-rounding or writing practice notes. Is this something that would ever be offered to residents?

Are you a resident or a medical student? I truly hope residents aren't writing "practice notes".

Most (all...?) residents have remote access. Many people write their notes at home and chart check at home. During the pandemic many residencies I'm familiar with, including my own, allowed for residents to see see clinic patients via telehealth. Mostly if you were on quarantine for COVID but some programs allowed healthy people to stay at home and see clinic patients. However with the thawing COVID precautions and patients desire to be seen in person, departments worried about losing office space or paying for offices no one was in, the majority of people were back to working in person before the pandemic was even halfway started.

So in short, yes you could. And with remote access you can try to cut down on some of your time spent in the hospital or clinic.

 

[shaggybill]

I'm not sure how things work post-Covid, but residents have scheduled times they are to either be in clinic or in the hospital. No way to shorten that, but I think most programs give you remote access so you can pre-chart or finish your charting from home to help minimize time spent at work. That being said, at my program, during inpatient rotations it was frowned up to leave the hospital before your charts were done because the incoming crew needed to have access to your intended plan.

 

[mvenus929]

I've had remote access as a medical student, resident, and fellow. As a resident, I would check the list of patients the day/night before I came on service to get familiar with them.

But in general, it doesn't shorten the time you need to be physically present. Residents aren't usually there just to round and go home--they're there for addressing any issues that come up throughout the day and to admit new patients (acknowledging that some residencies have it set up so half the team does go home after rounds). Which you have to be physically present for. Attendings just need to be available to answer questions from the residents.

Now, if you're in clinic, then sure, you can see the patients in clinic and finish up notes at home and not spend all that time in the clinic.

 

[RangerBob]

I generally pre-charted from home in the AM for my inpatients as well as outpatient visits, to better prep.

I never left early to document from home if that's what you're asking. We were expected to be on the inpatient unit from 8-5pm, and on outpatient were expected to be there until the last patient left. At that point I suppose we could go home and chart from home. I never did though, as the EMR is always faster to access/document in on-site than at home.

 

[deleted1139416]

Are you a resident or a medical student? I truly hope residents aren't writing "practice notes".

Most (all...?) residents have remote access. Many people write their notes at home and chart check at home. During the pandemic many residencies I'm familiar with, including my own, allowed for residents to see see clinic patients via telehealth. Mostly if you were on quarantine for COVID but some programs allowed healthy people to stay at home and see clinic patients. However with the thawing COVID precautions and patients desire to be seen in person, departments worried about losing office space or paying for offices no one was in, the majority of people were back to working in person before the pandemic was even halfway started.

So in short, yes you could. And with remote access you can try to cut down on some of your time spent in the hospital or clinic.

Yeah I’m a medical student lol. Just wanted to find out more about resident life!!

 

[deleted1139416]

Thank you all for the responses!

 

[Oso]

For inpatient teams, residents need to be in the hospital to follow up on plans, manage new issues that come up after rounds, admit new patients, and sign out to the incoming team. Sure you can pre chart and finish notes at home, but you still have to be there during your scheduled shift.

For clinic you obviously need to be there to see patients who come in for their appointments. ED has scheduled shifts.

Please don’t go into residency expecting to be able to do clinical work from home.

Now research, depending on the type of work, can be done remotely. Certain conferences and meetings have largely shifted to virtual since the start of the pandemic. Being able to do these things from home (when not on clinical service) has been especially nice.

 

[Dr.MONO]

Ok, so obviously, not “work from home” in the sense that someone with a regular office job works from home. But my IM attending does all her charting at home after work and looks at her patients charts at home before coming to work and puts in nee orders, etc. This is because the hospital gives her remote access to the EHR. Her time in the hospital is around 4 hours per day. When she’s not there we are either pre-rounding or writing practice notes. Is this something that would ever be offered to residents?

In psych residency, we do!

 

[Kaustikos]

Yeah I’m a medical student lol. Just wanted to find out more about resident life!!

Thank you all for the responses!

Residents life is long hours. Lots of things change during that day it'd be impossible to do it from home UNLESS you lived like 10 seconds away from the hospital. I can maybe see someone doing that. But I don't get why you'd want to do that.

 

[deleted1139416]

Residents life is long hours. Lots of things change during that day it'd be impossible to do it from home UNLESS you lived like 10 seconds away from the hospital. I can maybe see someone doing that. But I don't get why you'd want to do that.

Easy: charting in my underwear is the dream.

Besides, my wife works remotely so I can definetly live within a 2 minute walking distance to the hospital!!

 

[deleted1139416]

For anyone who’s interested, my attending is very happy with my note writing progress so she’s taking my “practice notes” on a shared Google doc and putting them into her own notes that she bills for!!

 

[RangerBob]

Easy: charting in my underwear is the dream.

Besides, my wife works remotely so I can definetly live within a 2 minute walking distance to the hospital!!

2 minutes likely isn't close enough. If your patient codes you can't say "sorry, I went home to chart in my underwear." Being in the bathroom/sleeping through the announcement are better excuses than leaving your patients. No risk management department is going to be ok with their inpatient residents routinely leaving the unit and charting from home.

Many attendings will let you go early sometimes for appointments and things, but counting on regularly going home seems quite unlikely. And you'd clearly need your attending's blessing to work on those notes from home.

My two cents is working from home is miserable. Who wants to take their work home? It blurs the lines. Leave work at work. It's what I do. I get the work done quicker, so I have more free time when I get home. And more important is when I get home, I can actually relax, as I don't have 1-2hrs of charting to do right away or later that evening. Everyone's psychology is different of course, so if it works for you and makes you happy (and is allowed by your attendings) then go for it.

 

[deleted1139416]

2 minutes likely isn't close enough. If your patient codes you can't say "sorry, I went home to chart in my underwear." Being in the bathroom/sleeping through the announcement are better excuses than leaving your patients. No risk management department is going to be ok with their inpatient residents routinely leaving the unit and charting from home.

Many attendings will let you go early sometimes for appointments and things, but counting on regularly going home seems quite unlikely. And you'd clearly need your attending's blessing to work on those notes from home.

My two cents is working from home is miserable. Who wants to take their work home? It blurs the lines. Leave work at work. It's what I do. I get the work done quicker, so I have more free time when I get home. And more important is when I get home, I can actually relax, as I don't have 1-2hrs of charting to do right away or later that evening. Everyone's psychology is different of course, so if it works for you and makes you happy (and is allowed by your attendings) then go for it.

I’ll take your word for it! I’m just going based off how much my attending loves doing her orders and charting from home!

 

[guytakingboards]

I’ll take your word for it! I’m just going based off how much my attending loves doing her orders and charting from home!

Your attending can do it because she has residents who are the boots on the ground.

 

[deleted1139416]

Your attending can do it because she has residents who are the boots on the ground.

Fair enough!