HI! I am currently in school for pre- vet and have been thinking a lot about doing emergency and critical care. I love the idea that I would have to think on my feet and that you would never know what would come in that night. Well I was looking at job opportunities in that area and most post only required a DVM or equivalent. So would doing a residency in emergency/ critical care be necessary? Or would it just add to the debt I would have? Any opinions or advise? Thank you!
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is a residency needed?
Started by kaitygirl07
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i think good mentorship and practice can make a good emergency clinician, however, a criticalist is a highly trained (i.e. residency) veterinarian who specializes in micromanaging the most intensive cases.
i think you should spend a lot of time shadowing both ER clinicians and ECC residents/specialists to get a better feel for the fields, because emergency and critical care really are two totally separate disciplines (and there quite a few people out there that want the ECC college to split). when i initially started out, i like ER much better than CC, but the tables have turned so to speak, and I am really intrigued by CC medicine. these are your patients on ventilators, 50 meds, tons of monitoring, etc.
also, what you described above is a pretty typical ER-type scenario. CC medicine is much more commonly caring for patients transferred to the facility for intensive care, many of which come in during the day because they come from GP and other day time specialists
i think you should spend a lot of time shadowing both ER clinicians and ECC residents/specialists to get a better feel for the fields, because emergency and critical care really are two totally separate disciplines (and there quite a few people out there that want the ECC college to split). when i initially started out, i like ER much better than CC, but the tables have turned so to speak, and I am really intrigued by CC medicine. these are your patients on ventilators, 50 meds, tons of monitoring, etc.
also, what you described above is a pretty typical ER-type scenario. CC medicine is much more commonly caring for patients transferred to the facility for intensive care, many of which come in during the day because they come from GP and other day time specialists
A residency is not required for really any emergency receiving positions. Residency training in Emergency and Critical Care is largely focused on critical care medicine which is generally a fairly small subset of emergency medicine. These would be the most intensive cases requiring ventilation, hemodialysis, treatment of sepsis/SIRS or other cases requiring intensive. Most positions for residency trained criticalists are more of a 8-5 position and I'm not aware of any hospitals that have criticalists in hospital 24/7.
I do think a rotating internship is valuable training if you are planning to go into emergency medicine. It is fairly commonly required for ER positions within speciality/referral hospitals and gives you more exposure to the referral medicine so you are better prepared for taking in referral cases.
I do think a rotating internship is valuable training if you are planning to go into emergency medicine. It is fairly commonly required for ER positions within speciality/referral hospitals and gives you more exposure to the referral medicine so you are better prepared for taking in referral cases.
@jmo1012 1012: so i guess I'm confused on the ER and ECC. when I was looking up grad schools they said er and critical care. so i guess i assumed it was one program is it not? what type of places would be ECC? I know of one Animal ER. But haven't heard of an ECC place to intern with.
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I agree with jmo1012. You should try to complete a bit of shadowing in the area because it's a lot more tiring and emotionally stressful than you might think.
Agree above. Especially, not only for a non-boarded DVM, but also as a newbie. You would most likely get the overnight hours as they are usually most undesirable, and it absolutely takes a toll on your emotions/life/sleep. You should definitely do a rotating internship and see if other areas intrigue you as well. In my opinion, if there's a specialty that you really enjoy, you should pursue the residency and become boarded. Yes, 3 more years of mediocre pay, however, the outcome is much greater. You'll definitely be happier with your paycheck that's for sure. 🙂
A boarded specialist will have the additional letters behind their name, DACVECC. You could also try looking at this list of specialists to see if there's one in your area: http://acvecc.org/members.php
A lot will depend on supply and demand --- there are many, many emergency clinics that do not have any Board certified Specialists working there at all, and there will be some locations where that will be expected to be hired full time (but not for part time vets). I would say that most do not require or expect a residency. I would recommend you not even consider that specialty until you've worked in an ER for a while as a DVM, since you may not want to do that level of care -- there are many excellent emergency vets who do more "routine" emergency work.
