Interventional Cardiology Jobs

[guzmaa]

Hey guys - i am considering career in IV cardiology.

A recruiter just told me that the market for IV cards is weaning and lots of AMGS and IMGS have been complaining.

what is your take on what the market will be in 3-4 years time.

Are we training too many Interventionalists?

Please provide your 2 cents.

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[bronx43]

Hey guys - i am considering career in IV cardiology.

A recruiter just told me that the market for IV cards is weaning and lots of AMGS and IMGS have been complaining.

what is your take on what the market will be in 3-4 years time.

Are we training too many Interventionalists?

Please provide your 2 cents.

From what I understand, the cath volume nationally has plateaued if not outright dropped due to better medical management, but there is also expansion of the scope of the field into things like peripheral stenting and structural cardiac interventions like TAVR. I think it'll be difficult to predict what the market will be like in 3-4 years time, let alone 10-15 years. This is what I've gathered reading and talking to people.

 

[josephf1]

all these posts about jobs in subspecialty cards
keep this in mind
1) while we all think we are gods gift to the world there is really no shortage of intelligent people especially once we add the indian subcontinent to provide medical services as cardiologist, IVC, or even EP which is probably the most mental of all 3 jobs.
2) $$$ being equal, everyone wants to live somewhere nice, unless they have some visa or family reason to be stuck in BF.
This leads to lots of cardiologists all living in the same parts of the country in the biggest cities.
The suppley > demand, therefore salaries trend down and doctors have to worl longer and harder to make a living.
All things being equal, the big cities are oversupplies and have lower pay. There is higher pay in BF where there are less doctors.
You will find PCPs in North Dakota making more than EPs in Boston.
Thats just the way it is.
You also arent going to get rich doing TAVI etc
At ACC last week all the IVC fellows I spoke with said they are making maybe 15% more than gen cards.
EPs were having trouble getting jobs.
Almost everyone was hedging their bets on gen cards and doing nucs and echos as well.
Where I train there are lots of community hospitals and a few academic centers and overall they say there are 80 device implanters and the need to implant abotu 50 devices a day. And not only EPs are impanting devices, also gen cards that did some electives as 3rd years, along with CT surgeons hunting for extra bizness.
The long story of it all is that cardiology is not a gold mine anymore.

 

[guzmaa]

I wonder if the prospect of jobs is better after Interventional training than General Cardiology particularly for an IMG.

 

[bronx43]

all these posts about jobs in subspecialty cards
keep this in mind
1) while we all think we are gods gift to the world there is really no shortage of intelligent people especially once we add the indian subcontinent to provide medical services as cardiologist, IVC, or even EP which is probably the most mental of all 3 jobs.
2) $$$ being equal, everyone wants to live somewhere nice, unless they have some visa or family reason to be stuck in BF.
This leads to lots of cardiologists all living in the same parts of the country in the biggest cities.
The suppley > demand, therefore salaries trend down and doctors have to worl longer and harder to make a living.
All things being equal, the big cities are oversupplies and have lower pay. There is higher pay in BF where there are less doctors.
You will find PCPs in North Dakota making more than EPs in Boston.
Thats just the way it is.
You also arent going to get rich doing TAVI etc
At ACC last week all the IVC fellows I spoke with said they are making maybe 15% more than gen cards.
EPs were having trouble getting jobs.
Almost everyone was hedging their bets on gen cards and doing nucs and echos as well.
Where I train there are lots of community hospitals and a few academic centers and overall they say there are 80 device implanters and the need to implant abotu 50 devices a day. And not only EPs are impanting devices, also gen cards that did some electives as 3rd years, along with CT surgeons hunting for extra bizness.
The long story of it all is that cardiology is not a gold mine anymore.

Too many cardiologists are being pumped out. That's pretty much what it comes down to, especially with this era of improvements in primary care. People are quitting smoking at a higher rate, the use of statins is going up, there is better hypertension management... it all points to decreased business for cardiovascular medicine. It also doesn't look like peripheral procedures, TAVIs, or CTOs are going to make up for the drop in PCIs in general. I would say that from a purely business/financial standpoint, GI, heme/onc, allergy may be the way to go. Heme onc looks to be getting more and more competitive, and GI/allergy are easily the two most competitive subspecialties in IM right now.

 

[guzmaa]

I have to agree on too many gen cards being trained but not too many intervetnionalisys around 200 a year.

So I was of belief that there ae plenty of IV jobs out there!!! are they NOT?

 

[sacrament]

I have to agree on too many gen cards being trained but not too many intervetnionalisys around 200 a year.

So I was of belief that there ae plenty of IV jobs out there!!! are they NOT?

As somebody who was recently out there looking for a job, I would characterize the market as being "ok" at best. I talked with probably a dozen groups, including a few in relatively desirable metro areas (e.g. Chicago, Seattle, NYC). Almost everybody is primarily interested in a candidate who can bring something more to the table than just coronaries (i.e. peripheral, structural). PCI volumes are not where they used to be, and I feel like some of these positions are being created simply to share STEMI call, not because the cath volume demands it. I honestly couldn't understand how some of these places were contemplating getting another interventionalist when their current folks were struggling to get 75 cases a year. Many of the interventional jobs are starting to look like "EP jobs" (i.e. mostly general cards with some procedural stuff on the side). I was lucky to land a job at a place where volume is actually outstripping manpower, but those seem to be few and far between, and who knows what the future holds. Percutaneous valve cases and CTOs might generate some volume but with the current generation of technology are too time-consuming to represent a financially viable way to spend a big chunk of your time.

 

[bronx43]

As somebody who was recently out there looking for a job, I would characterize the market as being "ok" at best. I talked with probably a dozen groups, including a few in relatively desirable metro areas (e.g. Chicago, Seattle, NYC). Almost everybody is primarily interested in a candidate who can bring something more to the table than just coronaries (i.e. peripheral, structural). PCI volumes are not where they used to be, and I feel like some of these positions are being created simply to share STEMI call, not because the cath volume demands it. I honestly couldn't understand how some of these places were contemplating getting another interventionalist when their current folks were struggling to get 75 cases a year. Many of the interventional jobs are starting to look like "EP jobs" (i.e. mostly general cards with some procedural stuff on the side). I was lucky to land a job at a place where volume is actually outstripping manpower, but those seem to be few and far between, and who knows what the future holds. Percutaneous valve cases and CTOs might generate some volume but with the current generation of technology are too time-consuming to represent a financially viable way to spend a big chunk of your time.

All this doesn't look to bode well for gen cards either, if EP and IV are both now relegated to doing general stuff. I love cardiology, but this field has really been watered down with almost 800 cardiologists being pumped into the market year after year - compared to about 400-500 for GI and heme/onc.

 

[OptimusPrime]

Hey guys - i am considering career in IV cardiology.

A recruiter just told me that the market for IV cards is weaning and lots of AMGS and IMGS have been complaining.

what is your take on what the market will be in 3-4 years time.

Are we training too many Interventionalists?

Please provide your 2 cents.

Yes.

Simple math decrease in need for coronary interventions/reimbursement combined with steady high arrival of new interventionalist annually does not bode well for the job market in the future.
Structural is mainly for large academic centers, very unlikely it will impact the private sector. Peripherals similar story plus peripherals in private world is a dog fight with IR and vascular surgery. Can't fight too hard because you will need to be friendly with your vasc surgeon in case you ever need them to bail you out if something goes very wrong.

One remote possibility and its a long shot is if Oschner starts teaching more int cardiologist to intervene in acute stroke. New patient market with not enough IR docs willing to be on acute stroke call 24/7 365. Then maybe we can get reimbursed like IR for a procedure for once.
Yeah right. If this pipe dream ever became more main stream we will end up spending man power to do large RCT to show no significant difference and pass guidelines to make sure no one ever attempts it or get reimbursed for it. You're welcome IR. We ruined your procedure for you. Haha.

OP