geriatrics fellowship after FM residency

[scharnhorst]

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Hi everyone
I am a second yr FM resident from WI
I had a few questions about geriatrics fellowship

1-can a FP doc see kids, younger adults as part of his practice after completing geriatrics fellowship? is it practically possible ?
or is he then limited only to older people

2-What is the malpractice enviorment for geriatricians

3- Is there pay only around $120,000 ? anyway this can be increased esp. for a geriatrician from an FP background?

4-can a geriatrician with FP backgound work as a hospitalist? I know that FP docs alone can work as hospitalist

5-What things I need to ask a program of geriatrics when applying to them ?

thanks

 

[The Janitor]

can a FP doc see kids, younger adults as part of his practice after completing geriatrics fellowship?

Of course. You don't forget everything you've learned about pediatrics simply because you did a one-year geriatrics fellowship.

What is the malpractice enviorment for geriatricians

No different.

Is there pay only around $120,000 ? anyway this can be increased esp. for a geriatrician from an FP background?

Geriatrics doesn't really affect your income all that much. Most of the patients in a typical FM or IM practice are geriatric already.

can a geriatrician with FP backgound work as a hospitalist?

Sure...why not?

 

[Farmer Jane]

I would think that completing a fellowship in geriatrics would actually give you an edge when applying for a hospitalist position. The vast majority of inpatients are elderly.

 

[deleted77919]

The income issue with geriatrics is that by definition most of your pts will be on medicare, which doesn't pay as well as private insurance (but does typically pay faster). Many FP's start capping medicare enrollment once they get to a certain pt panel size, when all of your pts are elderly you simply can't do that.

 

[McDoctor]

Hi everyone
I am a second yr FM resident from WI
I had a few questions about geriatrics fellowship

1-can a FP doc see kids, younger adults as part of his practice after completing geriatrics fellowship? is it practically possible ?
or is he then limited only to older people

2-What is the malpractice enviorment for geriatricians

3- Is there pay only around $120,000 ? anyway this can be increased esp. for a geriatrician from an FP background?

4-can a geriatrician with FP backgound work as a hospitalist? I know that FP docs alone can work as hospitalist

5-What things I need to ask a program of geriatrics when applying to them ?

thanks

1. Obviously you can, but the amount of pediatric patients you attract will depend on how you market yourself. If you are a self-described geriatric specialist, then you won't attract many peditaric patients. The perception of parents will be that you are less qualified to care for children, whether fair or not.

2. I doubt it would be any worse than general family med. probably, it's better. there is some expectation that an old person will become ill and potentially have complicated outcomes. The most fierce malpractice environments exist in caring for otherwise healthy people...like OB/GYN.

3. the pay is potentially worse since your patients are primarily medicare. The only way to make more in the current healthcare envrionment would be to see more patients. Eventually, you would be running a geriatric medicine mill, and the care you provide would be no better, even potentially worse, than that provided by a generalist. Money is no reason to go into this field.

The actual amount you make probably depends more on where you practice. salaries vary by geographic region, and my guess is rural areas with a paucity of competition earn better than urban areas with more specialty care.

4. yes, but there's no getting around the fact that the specialty best suited for being a hospitalist is general internal medicine, not family medicine.

5. No idea.

 

[cdow18]

Most of the FP's in this area that have done geriatric fellowship see mostly adults and older folks. Mainly b/c they got extra training in this area and that's what they mostly want to see. The way these guys make their money is to be medical directors for large nursing homes. I'm actually rotating with a geriatrician, he only has clinic three half days a week, the rest of the week he is seeing patients either in the nursing home or those that have been admitted to a hospital. He seems happy, has a decent lifestyle and he is certainly not hurting for money.