golden weekend?

[jjy2103]

so i thought that golden weekend every 4 weeks was a norm....(i.e. most programs have this by default)
i found out that one program does not have this...and it was mentioned by intern and resident as a negative of the program...

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[gutonc]

so i thought that golden weekend every 4 weeks was a norm....(i.e. most programs have this by default)
i found out that one program does not have this...and it was mentioned by intern and resident as a negative of the program...

if it was not mentioned at all, is it a given that the program gives golden weekends every 4th week? or is it something only a few programs provide?

With the recent change in work hour rules, golden weekends are becoming a thing of the past.

With the old rules: (24x7)/30 = 5.6, meaning that, over the course of a week you can cover a service/team with 5.6 people...over the course of a month you can cover this service with 4 people working 75% of the time which roughly pencils out to 5 days off a month, which works out to one golden weekend and 3 other days off (although you're only required to have 1 day/7 off averaged over 4 weeks).

Now the new rules: (24x7)/16 = 10.5, so now, where you used to need 5.5 people to cover a week of service/team, now you need 10.5...and you also need to give them all 4 days off a month. And we didn't magically lengthen the month or hire a bunch more residents. So guess what's going out the window? Golden weekends.

 

[obiwan]

With the recent change in work hour rules, golden weekends are becoming a thing of the past.

With the old rules: (24x7)/30 = 5.6, meaning that, over the course of a week you can cover a service/team with 5.6 people...over the course of a month you can cover this service with 4 people working 75% of the time which roughly pencils out to 5 days off a month, which works out to one golden weekend and 3 other days off (although you're only required to have 1 day/7 off averaged over 4 weeks).

Now the new rules: (24x7)/16 = 10.5, so now, where you used to need 5.5 people to cover a week of service/team, now you need 10.5...and you also need to give them all 4 days off a month. And we didn't magically lengthen the month or hire a bunch more residents. So guess what's going out the window? Golden weekends.

I don't know if any you guy's programs are doing this but for us some of the "days" off for the interns are scheduled where they are essentially leaving the hospital at night and coming in the next day in the evening where you have 24 hrs off but not really.

 

[dd128]

I don't know if any you guy's programs are doing this but for us some of the "days" off for the interns are scheduled where they are essentially leaving the hospital at night and coming in the next day in the evening where you have 24 hrs off but not really.

My lord....any idea if this is common?

 

[obiwan]

My lord....any idea if this is common?

I can't say but I wouldn't think so since most programs have more or less reverted to a true night float system while we're still preserving overnight call for some reason

 

[gutonc]

My lord....any idea if this is common?

Common? No. But this isn't the first I've heard of it. It definitely violates the spirit (and probably the letter) of the new work hour rules.

It's a simple math issue though. Same number of hours in the week. Same number of residents (interns specifically) to cover those hours. But now, where you could cover a week with 6 "resident days" (assuming a 30 hour day), now it takes almost 11 resident days (assuming a 16 hour day) to cover the same service. Tack on new IM RRC rules requiring more outpatient training and it just gets worse.

 

[JacobSilge]

Not as a regular occurrence, but it can often happen when you switch between days and nightfloat and visa versa.

 

[Top Gun]

so i thought that golden weekend every 4 weeks was a norm....(i.e. most programs have this by default)
i found out that one program does not have this...and it was mentioned by intern and resident as a negative of the program...

if it was not mentioned at all, is it a given that the program gives golden weekends every 4th week? or is it something only a few programs provide?

In my program, I didn't begin having true golden weekends till third year. Even if you weren't on call on a weekend, you still had to come in for a few hours on Saturday morning and see your patients before taking the rest of the day off. Either that, or that weekend I was usually postcall from Friday night.