kungfufishing said:
Most of the time when I tell a resident colleague what field I am in, the first thing I hear is "oh, that's great - no call, shiftwork, no followup, all you have to know is how to triage".
Fortunately, the majority of this pain you will deal with is from residents. In the community hospitals, sure, some people will not want to come IN after hours, but they are sure as hell happy to be involved in the case, involved in the followup, and often admit the people to see them in the morning.
But in reality, you're just going to learn how to deal with this and let it roll off your back.
For instance, when an orthopod or general surgeon says we "call them for everything," I offer to call ortho for every single musculoskeletal complaint, or surgery for every abdominal pain. No one has taken me up on that. Or when we have a busy trauma night, and the team is down for their 10th level one, and I hear the "You're killing us!!" I apologize for shooting the patient or hitting them with my car.
When dealing with other specialities you have to find a middle ground. We have some very meek EPs and some very brilliant ones who can be really condescending. You want to show an attitude of respect for other specialties opinions (surgeons especially like this) but also give the air that you expect professionalism and you're not going to take BS.
Our chair has always said the secret to EM is making people do what you want with a smile on their face.
mike
