Internship

[Cmot]

Can someone explain the difference between intership and residency. Also I was curious about how the whole internship thing works. Do interns that are specalizing in orthopedics have really long hours? What specialties have decent hours.
Thank you.

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[FutureM.D.]

I believe internshio is your first year in residency.

 

[Cmot]

i c

 

[Wahoo07]

So...

PGY 1 = Intern
PGY 2 = 2nd year resident ?

Right?

 

[SloppyJoe]

what does PGY stand for? I am jsut a curious -pre-dental student.

 

[Jani]

PGY = Post Graduate Year .

But could somebody please describe what intern/ residency period is like in most hospitals in NY ??

I guess it could be up to 50-80 hrs/wk.

But how are the terms like ? I mean for IM...
Do they rotate every few months to subspecialties + ER ?

Thanks in advance...

 

[Ratty]

Until the 1970's, -all- graduating medical students did an "internship." They were very similar to the current transitional year residency or osteopathic rotating internship year. During that year, they decided on their specialty and then went into residency afterwards. Internships were eliminated in 1973, I believe, and became the first year of residency.

Internship is the first year of residency, but the term "intern" has generally fallen out of style. Though the old-school docs who actually did an internship might still call PG1's "interns," I would say that most are simply "residents," just like PG2's, 3's, etc.

Despite the Bell laws, I do not believe that first year residents in New York work any less than most others across the country.

If you want to know the average number of work hours/week for all specialties, go to the FREIDA search engine (linked from the AMA's web site). You can find all that information there.

Yes, IM residents rotate through different subspecialties.

 

[Jani]

Ratty

Thanks for the deep historical facts. I guess Residency sounds much better... to me it does..

I found FREIDA description with hrs/wk which is going to be one of the major criteria for me when applying for 2003 match...

One thing that varies ( From FREIDA SITE) a lot from hospital to hospital is the nights frequency, did anybody else notice that ?
I am really surprised at the extreme options there..

 

[DuneHog]

At my school most PGY1s are still referred to as "interns." This may vary geographically, but I think this terminology still persists for a couple of reasons: 1) many programs require a more general intern year (prelim med, surg or transitional) before more specialized training (in radiology, neuro, surg subspecialties etc. 2) no matter what specialty you do, as an intern you are really just learning the ropes of the hospital, on call kind of stuff etc. You also do the scut for everyone else. Intern year for most people seems to involve much less reading and learning about the specialty. This really doesn't start until you are a PGY-2 or resident.

Hours for interns are pretty long across the boards. Interns in medicine or transitional year may have some outpatient rotations without call responsibilities, but internship in general is characterized by frequent call, long hours and lots of scut.

 

[fourthyear]

FRIEDA is a great resource, but I wouldn't put all my trust in the reports of work hours/wk or max hours consecutively on duty. I think each program self-reports the hours - so it's what they SAY their residents work, but maybe not matching reality.

I compared what FRIEDA reports to what I saw on my 3rd year rotations in the basic specialites. It was close-to-accurate on the general average of hours/wk. However, those consecutive max hours on duty?? How can they say only 24 hours? So that means if you come in at 6am, stay all night for call, then you leave the next morning at 6am? That DOES NOT HAPPEN - at least not now. I can't see how it really ever could b/c you have to at least add a few hours on to tell the oncoming team of residents about all your new patients you got overnight before going home. You can't just walk out of the hospital b/c it's been 24 hours.

So just take these numbers with a grain of salt. The best way to tell what really happens seems to be asking residents or even med students who are there and know the program. Another good resource seems to be new interns who have just last year gone through this application process - ask them where else they interviewed and what programs they thought were more livable.