How do you introduce yourself to the public?

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abcd3fg

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Now that I'm about to start my internship, I was wondering what the general consensus is on using the term "doctor" to introduce oneself to people asking what you do for a living, especially if you look really young. I see myself dealing with the following for the next 3-7 years:
"What do you do for a living?"
"I'm a doctor"
"Oh you're a doctor? But you look so young!"
"Well, I'm a resident"
"What does that mean?"
"I'm a doctor who is still in training"
"Oh so you're not a real MD..."
"Well, actually I do have an MD"
"Yeah uh huh ok..."

So what do people most commonly refer to themselves as? Doctor? Physician-in-training? Resident? Resident physician? Or just avoid the topic and say you're a janitor?
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abcd3fg said:
Now that I'm about to start my internship, I was wondering what the general consensus is on using the term "doctor" to introduce oneself to people asking what you do for a living, especially if you look really young. I see myself dealing with the following for the next 3-7 years:
"What do you do for a living?"
"I'm a doctor"
"Oh you're a doctor? But you look so young!"
"Well, I'm a resident""What does that mean?"
"I'm a doctor who is still in training"
"Oh so you're not a real MD..."
"Well, actually I do have an MD"
"Yeah uh huh ok..."

So what do people most commonly refer to themselves as? Doctor? Physician-in-training? Resident? Resident physician? Or just avoid the topic and say you're a janitor?
Click to expand...

"Looking young" doesn't magically stop when you become an attending. As a 1st year attending, I get told that I "look very young" A LOT. I usually brush it off. I would love to tell people that "Well, the online Mexican medical school course that I took was only 6 weeks long," but I figure that very few people would find that funny.

Just say "I'm a doctor." If people say that you look young, thank them, but there's no need to go into details about being a resident and what that means, and no you're a REAL doctor but you're in training before you become a FULL FLEDGED doctor, etc., etc., etc.
 
I honestly have resorted to having fun with it as the novelty has worn off, and I am tired of the same conversation, some of my suggestions include: slurpee refiller guy, professional sausage maker, vacuum salesman, malpractice attorney, pharmaceutical test subject. 10 times out of 10 these will lead to more interesting conversation.
That being said, the ol' doctor card is nice to occasionally pull out; single ladies, making reservations, dealing with various customer service reps etc...
 
Outside of work (hospital/clinic) I would not make mention of your occupation. Definitely never address yourself as doctor X outside of work. I tell people I work for the hospital and am vague about what type of clerical job I do. There is nothing to be gained from people knowing your profession unless you want to wear a legal target on your back. Americans are sue crazy.
 
DIce3 said:
Outside of work (hospital/clinic) I would not make mention of your occupation. Definitely never address yourself as doctor X outside of work./QUOTE]

^ This.

I never tell anyone I'm a doctor, unless I have no choice. I'm not afraid of lawsuits. I'm just tired of the inevitable medical questions that follow.

After I graduated from med school, my wife had our checks (yes, we still used checks back then) changed, and put "MD" after my name, I could've strangled her. Every cashier would ask, "Oh, what kind of doctor are you?" Most of the time, I'd answer "proctologist." That tended to keep the questions to a minimum. 😉
Click to expand...
 
Them: "Who are you?"
Me: "I'm gut."
T: what do you do?
Me: I breathe, ride my bike, play with my kid and drink beer.
T: I mean for a living.
Me: I'm a doctor
(Here's where you get the variations.)
T: "What kind?"/"Oh...hey look, my drink is empty, I'll be right back."
Me: An oncologist./....
T: So you treat people with diabetes?
Me: No, cancer/ (note that the other person has meanwhile gone to the bar, purchased and slammed another drink, gotten in a fight with the bartender and is currently being escorted to the sidewalk by a couple of burly bald dudes)
T: Oh...that must suck. Oh...hey look, my drink is empty, I'll be right back.

Pretty much every single conversation goes like this. You get used to it.
 
Great stories above ^^.

To OP, What's wrong with saying, "I'm a Resident Physician" ?
 
DIce3 said:
Outside of work (hospital/clinic) I would not make mention of your occupation. Definitely never address yourself as doctor X outside of work. I tell people I work for the hospital and am vague about what type of clerical job I do. There is nothing to be gained from people knowing your profession unless you want to wear a legal target on your back. Americans are sue crazy.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I kind of avoid it. I don't want the mechanic to think I can afford an expensive repair just because I'm a doctor 😀

Seriously though, how often does it come up in conversation? Some guy on another forum once said "People ask you what you do for a living so they can tell you what they do." He tells people he's a cubicle worker in the tech industry, even though he's an Apache helicopter pilot in the Army with a long military record. I don't think that you can't tell people what you do, but as soon as I read that (this was ~4 years ago), I realized that's what I did (ask them, so I could talk about myself). So I don't ask people what they do, and I don't offer it up unless someone really asks me. Then I tell them I'm a surgery resident.
 
DIce3 said:
Outside of work (hospital/clinic) I would not make mention of your occupation. Definitely never address yourself as doctor X outside of work. I tell people I work for the hospital and am vague about what type of clerical job I do. There is nothing to be gained from people knowing your profession unless you want to wear a legal target on your back. Americans are sue crazy.
Click to expand...

Agreed. We purchased a BMW with my husband a few weeks ago. The guy asked us what we did, my husband answered and then said "my wife works in the hospital." So the guy is like - are you a dr? So I said yes. Then he asked what kind, I said I was currently going into rads. He said oh, rads make great $$, and tells my husband, come back and buy a Masseratti (sp?) when your wife makes a million. Lol.

People really have a bad/unrealistic impression of what Drs make and what not. I also got grilled for about 1/2 an hour on how to treat IBS by one of the car sales people. I said, perhaps you should go back to the GI you were seeing. 🙂 So definitely try to be vague when possible.
 
I get the "you look too young to be a doctor" thing all the time, I say I've had work, that tends to stop the conversation.

I don't advertise it outside of the hospital unless it would be helpful in some way, would never tell a mechanic etc
 
Blue Dog said:
I paid cash for my 328i in 2009 (well, cash + my old 530i as a trade-in). The salesperson asked me what I did for a living. I told him I was a drug dealer. He didn't act surprised. 😉
Click to expand...

Haha. We are not paying cash, but yeah I feel odd telling people in a non-hospital environmental that I'm a doctor. I typically give a non-committal, "I work in healthcare or in a hospital."

People otherwise think that they can charge more for some reason.
 
I try not to say anything because I get tired of folks asking me about their fibromyalgia and opinions on the latest diet pill.

Today I was trading in my rental car that I hated for a smaller one. The lady looks at my paperwork.

Lady: Oh, you're a doctor?
Me: yes
Lady: What kind?
Me. family practice
Lady: Do you know how to take off skin tags?
Me: sure grab them with tweezer and cut them with a scissors..
Lady: Ewww, so you have to see the blood?
Me: it's not that much
Lady: What about that cream they talk about on TV?
Me: I don't watch TV ma'am, I wouldn't know.
<SIlence> as I walked away.
 
Last edited:
cabinbuilder said:
I try not to say anything because I get tired of folks asking me about their fibromyalgia and opinions on the latest diet pill.

Today I was trading in my rental car that I hated for a smaller one. The lady looks at my paperwork.

Lady: Oh, you're a doctor?
Me: yes
Lady: What kind?
Me. family practice
Lady: Do you know how to take off skin tags?
Me: sure grab them with tweezer and cut them with a scissors..
Lady: Ewww, so you have to see the blood?
Me: it's not that much
Lady: What about that cream they talk about on TV?
Me: I don't watch TV ma'am, I wouldn't know.
<SIlence> as I walked away.
Click to expand...

Lol, "I don't watch TV ma'am."
 
I graduate on Monday, but I've been telling people I'm the Chief of Cardiology for months.
 
I introduce myself to patients and families as "Dr. Quimica, one of the resident doctors." Usually people don't ask what a resident doctor is. Everyone else at the hospital calls me by my first name. Outside the hospital, what I do doesn't come up all that much. But then again, one of my med school classmates told me that the reason panhandlers never asked me for money was because I looked like a homeless person in this old trenchcoat I wore, so...not sure even now that people see me and go, cha-ching! :shrug:
 
When I was looking for places to stay a few weeks ago in the city I'll be moving to this summer, I thought I was doing myself a favor by telling the agent I was a doctor. I think she ended up giving me the more expensive apartments by telling me the less expensive ones aren't available anymore.
 
I try to shy away from these conversations as much as possible.

work is work and time for Dr. McAwesomepants and all times not at work I want to be "dude-man-brah".

when random average people find out what you do for a living they invariably project their own opinions and ideas of what physicians do upon you which is just annoying.

it usually only comes up when my SO has told her friends what I do..

random person: so you're a doctor, huh?
me: yeah i work in the ER
r: what are you going to specialize in?
me: I will be an ER doctor.
r: oh, one time my grandma went to the ER and then she died.
me: I'm sorry for your loss.
r: this other time I went to the ER and they put 4 stitches in my boo boo and then I got a bill for $4000
me: I'm sorry
r: and i had to wait 4 hours and there were lots of nasty people around me
me: Sorry
r: so it must be exciting, you must see a lot of crazy stuff.
me: yes it is exciting and we see everything.
r: whats the craziest thing you have ever seen?

this is the point where based on how annoying the person has been I either downplay it (if they were not annoying) or if they're really annoying let loose some horrific, tragic, graphic tale which ends up making people at the table lose their appetite and feel disgusted in humanity.

at this point my fiance usually gives me the "wtf is wrong with you" look and we go back to normal awkward conversation.
 
I usually have one of 3 answers, depending on how snarky I'm feeling:

1) I'm a lifeguard (as in guarding the shallow end of the gene pool)

2) I work as an order-entry clerk in the ER (and my lovely EMR makes this entirely true)

3) I'm an emergency physician (only dropped when I feel the "doctor card" needs to be dropped)

Otherwise, I avoid discussing at all costs... lots of loonies out there and don't want to be sucked into their personal crazy gravity well.

Cheers!
-d

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk
 
Yea I started being careful talking about my job outside the hospital after I went for a haircut shortly after starting residency and then was captive audience to hearing about this lady's shoulder arthritis....
 
I've started introducing myself as a respiratory therapist. I think it explains why I'm not at work during the middle of the day.
 
abcd3fg said:
Now that I'm about to start my internship, I was wondering what the general consensus is on using the term "doctor" to introduce oneself to people asking what you do for a living, especially if you look really young. I see myself dealing with the following for the next 3-7 years:
"What do you do for a living?"
"I'm a doctor"
"Oh you're a doctor? But you look so young!"
Click to expand...

Answer- thank you

This should end the converstation
 
I've been wondering about a similar question. When people ask me what I do for a living, the answer choices I consider are:

"Psychiatrist" - would be fine, except that I'm not a board certified psychiatrist yet.

"Doctor" - is correct in every sense of the word, but then people inevitably ask "what kind of doctor?" and when I say "I'm training to be a psychiatrist", it sounds like I was trying to be dishonest when I said "doctor," since people don't realize that psychiatrists are real doctors.

"Writer" is my favorite option, since I do quite a bit of freelance writing... but during residency, writing will only make up about 20% of my income, so I think this will also feel a bit dishonest, since I don't really do it "for a living" if most of my living comes from elsewhere.

Maybe I should just say that I'm a scientist. It's accurate (I'm planning to go into a research-oriented career and I'm at a research-oriented residency program), it's vague (so it doesn't sound like I'm misrepresenting myself), and it's still interesting/respectable.
 
This is my plan for when I graduate in 2 weeks. Fill in the blank with whatever kind of resident you are.


What do you do?

I'm a doctor.

What kind?

I'm a general practitioner training to be a👎 _________.
 
ElwayFan said:
This is my plan for when I graduate in 2 weeks. Fill in the blank with whatever kind of resident you are.


What do you do?

I'm a doctor.

What kind?

I'm a general practitioner training to be a👎 _________.
Click to expand...

That doesn't really work and is pretty misleading. First, it depends on people's definition of a GP. Second, no definition of GP fits what a resident is.
 
When July comes, I'm just going to say "I work with kids" (going into Peds)
 
pooh86 said:
When July comes, I'm just going to say "I work with kids" (going into Peds)
Click to expand...

Most folks know what a pediatrician is but don't know what a neonatologist is. I get the "Oh you deliver babies!" a good bit. So, I usually say:

"I'm a baby doctor"

Then I refer them to The Little Couple on TLC to find out what that job entails.😛
 
I never realized there was so much drama involved with telling people what you do. Can't I just say "I'm a doctor, training in emergency medicine"? Will people really attack me with medical questions and then sue me just for that??
 
Anon212 said:
I never realized there was so much drama involved with telling people what you do. Can't I just say "I'm a doctor, training in emergency medicine"? Will people really attack me with medical questions and then sue me just for that??
Click to expand...

Realistically, probably not... but don't forget that somebody successfully sued McDonald's because she spilled hot coffee on her lap (while holding the cup with her thighs, no less) and was burned - she argued it was TOO hot and there wasn't any warning on the cup that the coffee was indeed hot.

#facepalm

All you need is to have someone argue that somehow your advice constituted a DPR and <boom!> lawsuit... would probably get tossed, but not without time & resources.

I personally don't find any of that risk acceptable.

-d

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk
 
shan564 said:
I've been wondering about a similar question. When people ask me what I do for a living, the answer choices I consider are:

"Psychiatrist" - would be fine, except that I'm not a board certified psychiatrist yet.

"Doctor" - is correct in every sense of the word, but then people inevitably ask "what kind of doctor?" and when I say "I'm training to be a psychiatrist", it sounds like I was trying to be dishonest when I said "doctor," since people don't realize that psychiatrists are real doctors.

"Writer" is my favorite option, since I do quite a bit of freelance writing... but during residency, writing will only make up about 20% of my income, so I think this will also feel a bit dishonest, since I don't really do it "for a living" if most of my living comes from elsewhere.

Maybe I should just say that I'm a scientist. It's accurate (I'm planning to go into a research-oriented career and I'm at a research-oriented residency program), it's vague (so it doesn't sound like I'm misrepresenting myself), and it's still interesting/respectable.
Click to expand...

Wait, psychiatrists are real doctors?
 
Anon212 said:
I never realized there was so much drama involved with telling people what you do. Can't I just say "I'm a doctor, training in emergency medicine"? Will people really attack me with medical questions and then sue me just for that??
Click to expand...

No, but you'll quickly get a sense of just how little the average person knows about what we do, and many of them aren't shy about sharing their misconceptions. It's difficult to listen to, and you're unlikely to improve their understanding during a casual conversation. Anonymity is often the path of least resistance.

Regarding medical advice, veterinarians have it far worse. Stand next to one at a party and listen to everyone ask about their pet's problems.
 
b-real said:
Wait, psychiatrists are real doctors?
Click to expand...

Ha... you know those times when you intentionally set yourself up for a clever remark and then just wait for somebody to get to it? It happens to me on SDN all the time, but it's rare that somebody actually picks up on it. I specifically wrote "real doctors" instead of "medical doctors" in the hope that somebody would post that comment.

Small victories...
 
If I am doing something casual like playing golf, I introduce myself as Greg. If I am establishing a professional relationship with a patient, I introduce myself as Dr. _____________.

If I am asked what I do, I am a doctor doing my residency at X.
 
greg1184 said:
If I am doing something casual like playing golf, I introduce myself as Greg. If I am establishing a professional relationship with a patient, I introduce myself as Dr. _____________.

If I am asked what I do, I am a doctor doing my residency at X.
Click to expand...

One of the things that happens in a professional setting/hospital is when you have a complicated last name that patients have a hard time pronouncing/recalling. Then they frequently call you "Dr. First name" - that sometimes makes things weird.
 
IamnotFreud said:
One of the things that happens in a professional setting/hospital is when you have a complicated last name that patients have a hard time pronouncing/recalling. Then they frequently call you "Dr. First name" - that sometimes makes things weird.
Click to expand...

I actually thought about this because I have one of those names. I thought of simply saying "Just call me Dr. S." First initial of my last name.
 
greg1184 said:
I actually thought about this because I have one of those names. I thought of simply saying "Just call me Dr. S." First initial of my last name.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I figured I'd do the same thing.

On a related note, I had a boss with a pretty simple Anglo-Saxon last name, but he still went by "Dr. P." I think he was just trying to be cool...
 
Daiphon said:
Realistically, probably not... but don't forget that somebody successfully sued McDonald's because she spilled hot coffee on her lap (while holding the cup with her thighs, no less) and was burned - she argued it was TOO hot and there wasn't any warning on the cup that the coffee was indeed hot.

#facepalm
Click to expand...

Well, to be fair to the woman who sued, it wasn't quite as stupid as it's normally made out to be. At least imo.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald's_Restaurants

"she had suffered third-degree burns on six percent of her skin and lesser burns over sixteen percent. She remained in the hospital for eight days while she underwent skin grafting. During this period, Liebeck lost 20 pounds (9 kg, nearly 20% of her body weight), reducing her down to 83 pounds (38 kg). Two years of medical treatment followed."

"McDonald's required franchisees to serve coffee at 180–190 °F (82–88 °C). At that temperature, the coffee would cause a third-degree burn in two to seven seconds. ...a number of other establishments served coffee at a substantially lower temperature than McDonald's"

"from 1982 to 1992 the company had received more than 700 reports of people burned by McDonald's coffee to varying degrees of severity, and had settled claims arising from scalding injuries for more than $500,000."

b-real said:
Wait, psychiatrists are real doctors?
Click to expand...

The last person I told that I was a psychiatrist responded with a story of how he used to attend anger management classes and once got to lead a session since he had been there for so long.
 
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