How to go into occupational medicine

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I am a 2nd year medical student, and this field is very new to me. I have a quick questions that I'm hoping someone can answer. If you are a occupational medicine resident, please let me know.

1. How does one get into occupational medicine? Is it considered a fellowship after IM or a residency itself? How long is the residency?

2. How competitive is the field? Would getting a MPH after 2nd year of medical school reduce the residency length, or help in getting in ?

3. What is the future job outlook? On salary.com it says the average doc in occupational medicine makes 200k, is this true?

4. What is the residency hours/workload like?

 

[inspirationmd]

I am a 2nd year medical student, and this field is very new to me. I have a quick questions that I'm hoping someone can answer. If you are a occupational medicine resident, please let me know.

1. How does one get into occupational medicine? Is it considered a fellowship after IM or a residency itself? How long is the residency?

2. How competitive is the field? Would getting a MPH after 2nd year of medical school reduce the residency length, or help in getting in ?

3. What is the future job outlook? On salary.com it says the average doc in occupational medicine makes 200k, is this true?

4. What is the residency hours/workload like?

Not an occupational medicine resident by I did quite a bit of research with one of the more prominent program and it's fellows when I was in college and early in Med school.

You have to do a prelim year at minimum (most competitive folks complete a full residency) ad then you go into a 2 year program. 1st year is a MPH where you get wide exposure to occupational and environmental medicine. 2nd year is mainly just clinics where you gain exposure working with various groups (ie factory workers, firefighters, or whatever group your program has a great relationship with). Not very competitive except at the highest levels.

These guys tend to work 40-50 hours when they finish from what I saw with most salaries around $200K though it can be much higher in private practice if you get multiple lucrative contracts or in industry if you become a corporate medical director.

Definitely thought about trying to become this guy when I was younger in my med career and he definitely makes more than $200K.

http://www.whatispublichealth.org/careers/PfizerGuide/corpMD.pdf

The big program websites are pretty descriptive of what their grads do so I'd hit their websites. Andecdotally of my two bosses: 1 is working at a private practice with a hospital and climbing it's ranks and the other was a Hospitalist manager for a hospital that grabbed a top tier MBA and is now chasing the CEO suite for a major health system. Both completed an initial clinical residency before doing the Occ Med fellowship.

 

[inspirationmd]

Also if you grab a MPH and specialize in occupational and environmental medicine I do think you can reduce the length but it's program specific if I remember correctly (thought about that too). Give some places a call to see if still the case. It's been some years since I looked into that.

 

[Leukocyte]

All programs require AT LEAST one year in a primary care specialty. Many programs PREFER to take applicants who completed a full primary care specialty. Some programs ONLY take applicants who completed a primary care specialty.

Preventive Medicine fellow

 

[Leukocyte]

Also if you grab a MPH and specialize in occupational and environmental medicine I do think you can reduce the length but it's program specific if I remember correctly (thought about that too). Give some places a call to see if still the case. It's been some years since I looked into that.

Recently, the ABPM changed the guidelines regarding the "MPH year" and the "Practicum year". There is no such thing anymore. So the MPH is no longer done in one year. Now in all programs you need to take the MPH classes over 2 years WHILE you are doing the clinical practicum rotations. This is in an effort to increase the clinical exposure in Preventive Medicine residencies.

I am not aware of any PM RESIDENCY program that would shorten your residency training if you already have a MPH. This is because you MUST have 3 (three) post-graduate years (and completed all the ABPM residency requirements) to be eligible to be board certified by the ABPM. For people who already have a MPH, programs usually have them do the MS-epidemiology curriculum instead. Regardless if you have a MPH or not, you NEED to fullfill the ABPM residency requirements (which are many).

 

[inspirationmd]

Recently, the ABPM changed the guidelines regarding the "MPH year" and the "Practicum year". There is no such thing anymore. So the MPH is no longer done in one year. Now in all programs you need to take the MPH classes over 2 years WHILE you are doing the clinical practicum rotations. This is in an effort to increase the clinical exposure in Preventive Medicine residencies.

I am not aware of any PM RESIDENCY program that would shorten your residency training if you already have a MPH. This is because you MUST have 3 (three) post-graduate years (and completed all the ABPM residency requirements) to be eligible to be board certified by the ABPM. For people who already have a MPH, programs usually have them do the MS-epidemiology curriculum instead. Regardless if you have a MPH or not, you NEED to fullfill the ABPM residency requirements (which are many).

I did not know about the new guideline changes regarding MPH year and Pratcium year integration. Good information to know. As for the MPH thing I guess it may have changed since its been 7 years since I worked with that fellow but I can assure you in 2006 that was not true. He was IM boarded with a MPH and he only did the practicum year. Again I acknowledge that it may have changed and as a current PM fellow you certainly know better than me now.

 

[Leukocyte]

I did not know about the new guideline changes regarding MPH year and Pratcium year integration. Good information to know. As for the MPH thing I guess it may have changed since its been 7 years since I worked with that fellow but I can assure you in 2006 that was not true. He was IM boarded with a MPH and he only did the practicum year. Again I acknowledge that it may have changed and as a current PM fellow you certainly know better than me now.

The new ACPM residency/fellowship guidlines are very new and are just now being implemented. In the past, PM residency/fellowship programs were 2 years where you do the MPH in one year, and then do the clinical rotations in the other year. That is no longer the case now. Now with the new guidlines, the MPH classes and the clinical rotations are done together at the same time and spread over the 2 years. By this, the ACPM hopes that PM residents/fellows will get more clinical rotation experience time when compared to the old (1+1) system. So now with the new training guidlines one needs:

- "A minimum of 24 months of training in the Preventive Medicine Residency"

So now, less importance is given towards the MPH, and more improtance is given towrads the clinical preventive medicine experience.

This is the link: http://www.acpm.org/?GMERequirements