Hours Seen During Residency

[PD3]

Hello all,

I have been lurking for a while and have been looking into radiology. I am curious how many hours a week radiology residents are seeing. I have read all over that other specialties are putting in way over the "80 hour" week and was wondering how it worked with radiology.

Thanks in advance for the help.

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[Vince]

I don't think anyone in my program busts 80hrs a week....I am only a first year and for the first 6months of residency and last 6 months the hours are basically 8am-5pm(or less) with no call and no weekends. Probably the average for those that are taking call is about 60 or so. Not bad.

 

[Docxter]

Radiology has very wide range of working hours. Also it's very different depending which year you are. Often, the first years (PGY-2) starting out and the graduating class, especially the last six months have it very easy, though there may be exceptions. There are various call schemes among different programs, such as night float vs. no night float system, one resident covering everything vs. one covering one area and another covering another, separate angio call or not, separate CT-US call or not, etc. In programs where there are fewer residents, there will be more frequent call. There are programs that you come work on Saturdays too. Very wide range. For example in my residency, I had to do a couple stretches of q2 call during an outside rotation, added up to more than 120 hours a week. During my nightfloat rotations, I would do either 14 or 28 straight nights without any night off, each night 15 hours. On the other hand, there were many months that I didn't do any call at all and did the usual 7:30 to 6:00 average day. Some rotations, such as interventional started early at 6:00AM. Some other rotations finished late anywhere from 8:00-10:00PM. One easy rotation was from 7:30 to 3:30 or 4:00. So even within a single residency, there was wide variation. When the 80 hr rule came out, our call schedule had to change to be compatible. Overall, you take less call that surgery or some medicine programs. However, the intensity of the call can be very very high, especially in major hospitals and trauma centers. It's not medicine or surgery that can be hit or miss. In these busy centers, you'll be very very busy.

 

[hans19]

My R1 year and R2 years, I averaged 60 hours a week, INCLUDING call.
Now that I take call much less frequently, its probably about 50+ hours a week?
But we work every minute of those 50's, almost no down time. Much less on GI and Nucs rotations, much more on IR rotations.

 

[PD3]

Thank you for the input, it is greatly appreciated.

 

[Reaganite]

My R1 year and R2 years, I averaged 60 hours a week, INCLUDING call.
Now that I take call much less frequently, its probably about 50+ hours a week?
But we work every minute of those 50's, almost no down time. Much less on GI and Nucs rotations, much more on IR rotations.

I think this is a very important point--one that I definitely saw while doing a radiology elective. Yeah, rad residents may work at most 60 hours a week, but they are working pretty much non-stop. It's not like medicine where you have down-time. In all honesty, I do not understand why people consider rads a lifestyle specialty.

 

[p53]

# of hours at the hospital during residency is moot. No one counts the number of hours that a radiology resident must read at night outside of the hospital. Also, don't forget about the physics board exam everyone must pass. Residents prepare for this exam at night after working all day. Radiology is NOT easy. In fact, radiology residents are responsible for more outside reading than any other specialty (Pathology and Rad Onc are also in the mix).