Is Trauma Surgery Really a Lifestyle Specialty Now?

[94hdogs]

Hey everyone,

I've been doing some research and after watching this video ((207) So You Want to Be a TRAUMA SURGEON [Ep. 8] - YouTube) I'm wondering if trauma surgery really is a lifestyle specialty. I feel like the tone of a lot of discussions here has framed a lot of would be specialties like radiology and anesthesiology into extreme burnout specialties, and I'm wondering if the man in the video is framing trauma surgery as a lifestyle specialty choice, when it really isn't. With the advent of trauma turning into shift work, does anyone know if trauma surgeons still experience the same level of burnout as they did previously? I'm considering IR vs gen surg/trauma, but I ultimately wanna do a specialty that I can take on for the long haul well into retirement age and above. I don't see a lot of older EM docs still practicing, and I suspect that's because of the excessive burnout they experience.

Please keep in mind that I'm a lowly M1 that has no idea what he's talking about. 🙂

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[ACSurgeon]

Not a lifestyle specialty. It is very stressful. At some places you’ll do 36 hour shifts. Others will require home call. Every institution will have its own balance of trauma/acute care and cc, and the amount of time on/time off will vary.

if you define “lifestyle” as having a lot of time off, then acute care/trauma/critical care IS a specialty with potential to have 10-15 days off per month.

 

[TypeADissection]

I don't think it's a lifestyle specialty at all. It also largely depends on where you end up practicing. Where I did my residency, it was divided into week long rotations. So someone would do ICU for a week, then ACS, then trauma, then clinic/elective. The clinic/elective week really became the time they would take to be out of the hospital because it's one day of clinic and some hernias and stoma takedowns scattered throughout. There's also a lot of cross covering, so if multiple trauma activations take place, then everyone comes into the trauma bays to start sorting the disasters. I'm in a community practice now and it's much more general surgery/ACS oriented than trauma being a level two center. So your lifestyle and the cases you do will be largely dependent on where you end up. One of my attendings was really into ICU and critical care and was hands down truly excellent at it. But he really hated elective general surgery and I couldn't see him thriving in the practice I'm in right now where most of it is elective and the "urgent" stuff is more ACS than high acuity trauma. Cheers.

 

[mikeGR]

I agree with the above comments. I think there are 2 elements here: how you define a "lifestyle" specialty and what ACS looks like.

For some people, "lifestyle" means they have a lot of time off. For others, it means that when they're off, they don't have to worry about getting called. For others, it means that when they're on, the job is not stressful.

ACS can offer you the first two, but it really depends on the practice. There is no doubt there will be a lot of pressure (or excitement, for some) when you're on, unless I imagine in a small rural hospital. In many practices, the ACS service has a similar setup as the hospitalists, and some end up working full-time and still have 26 weeks off in a year. But the other 26 weeks will be pretty intense.

The other option ACS will afford you is that you can always transition to full-time CC (or elective general surgery, or both), if you are so inclined. For some this may be considered less intense, but again it depends on the practice/hospital.

Doing shift-work is really rare in surgery and that is why ACS is considered more lifestyle-friendly than some of the other surgical subspecialties. But I wouldn't go as far as comparing it to rads or some medical subspecialties.

 

[Jolie South]

Trauma surgery is not a lifestyle specialty.

- Constant switching of hours from day shifts to night shifts
- Required in house call
- Taking care of other people’s complications
- Taking care of a lot of nonoperative issues and dealing with lots of consultants.
- No regular elective operative schedule

While vascular is not a lifestyle specialty, the lack of regular elective operative schedule was the final factor that led me away from trauma.

 

[ACSurgeon]

Trauma surgery is not a lifestyle specialty.

- Constant switching of hours from day shifts to night shifts
- Required in house call
- Taking care of other people’s complications
- Taking care of a lot of nonoperative issues and dealing with lots of consultants.
- No regular elective operative schedule

While vascular is not a lifestyle specialty, the lack of regular elective operative schedule was the final factor that led me away from trauma.

I think a fair bit of trauma and ACS surgeons will have some elective cases. Our group tries to have 1 scheduled elective case per call day to start off the day. Before Covid we’d sometimes have two/day. Depending on the setup you can have a lot of time off and have a side elective practice going as well.

 

[Consigliere]

Hey everyone,

I've been doing some research and after watching this video ((207) So You Want to Be a TRAUMA SURGEON [Ep. 8] - YouTube) I'm wondering if trauma surgery really is a lifestyle specialty. I feel like the tone of a lot of discussions here has framed a lot of would be specialties like radiology and anesthesiology into extreme burnout specialties, and I'm wondering if the man in the video is framing trauma surgery as a lifestyle specialty choice, when it really isn't. With the advent of trauma turning into shift work, does anyone know if trauma surgeons still experience the same level of burnout as they did previously? I'm considering IR vs gen surg/trauma, but I ultimately wanna do a specialty that I can take on for the long haul well into retirement age and above. I don't see a lot of older EM docs still practicing, and I suspect that's because of the excessive burnout they experience.

Please keep in mind that I'm a lowly M1 that has no idea what he's talking about. 🙂

Jesus Sparky, finish medical school first.

 

[94hdogs]

Jesus Sparky, finish medical school first.

Yeah you prolly right dawg. I don't wanna wait too long to decide tho. It's competitive AF out there.

 

[deleted547339]

Jesus Sparky, finish medical school first.

Wow. What did Consigliere do to get canned?