Lifestyle during residency

[deleted421268]

What kind of lifestyle does one have as a medical resident? Do most medical residents buy houses or I'm assuming they do apartments during there time as residents and once residency is over make changes?

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[fourandtwo]

I have always assumed the first few years of residency were worse than med school itseld

 

[RNtoMD87]

I have always assumed the first few years of residency were worse than med school itseld

I've spoken to some attendings I worked with. They say they enjoyed residency more than medschool because it was doing what they wanted to do, but that it was more strenuous and demanding.

 

[NITRAS]

A lot of that depends on where you do residency and which residency.

Most residents make $50k and have six figure debts. They usually move once they are done. A three year residency in a slow housing market probably isn’t going to be financially advisable to go through the hassle of ownership.

I rented (and glad I did). The market actually took a dump when I Graduated. I know plenty of attendings who have rent houses because they couldn’t sell.

On clinic weeks I worked 35-40hour weeks, probably 60 hour weeks on ward months, and closer to 75ish on most ICU, but I loved residency 100times more than med school.

 

[DrRiker]

A lot of that depends on where you do residency and which residency.

Most residents make $50k and have six figure debts. They usually move once they are done. A three year residency in a slow housing market probably isn’t going to be financially advisable to go through the hassle of ownership.

I rented (and glad I did). The market actually took a dump when I Graduated. I know plenty of attendings who have rent houses because they couldn’t sell.

On clinic weeks I worked 35-40hour weeks, probably 60 hour weeks on ward months, and closer to 75ish on most ICU, but I loved residency 100times more than med school.

Just curious, what specialty did you work in? Did your 35-40 hour weeks include charting, research, and other work done outside work hours?

 

[getdown]

Depends on the area you're doing you're training. When I interviewed in Oklahoma, they brought out a real estate agent as part of the interview day as it was a better idea to buy then rent (roughly the same cost and most were locals and planning to stay anyway). When I ended up in OC for residency, you couldn't buy a dishwasher box to live in cause it was too expensive. However, pay in residency will be somewhat adjusted to local cost of living but your money definitely goes farther in places NOT california or New York.

Do not expect to have much of a life during residency. You're expected to work and learn about your chosen field. You can have fun obviously but you're likely working 60-70 hours a week, call, night shifts, etc AT THE VERY LEAST. Too many residents feel like they can skimp out on their training and cut corners and dump work off on others. STUPID!! The best time to see and learn and make mistakes is DURING residency when you have minimal liability. You really want to make your first **** up or try something for the first time when you're practicing on your own license? If you're not learning at least 1 thing new everyday during residency you've wasted your day.

 

[NITRAS]

Just curious, what specialty did you work in? Did your 35-40 hour weeks include charting, research, and other work done outside work hours?

IM in a community hospital. Frankly, our clinics were never great, and rarely booked (the EMR was horrible). They ran 9-430 with lunch break. I did research on my own time, but didn't do much of it. You really should get your charting done as you go, life gets better. My PD didn't allow us to moonlight, so that wasn't an option.

The resident clinic where I currently work is better run, and has quite a few more patients, but I don't work there.

I spent most of the time in an inpatient setting. You find real quick that a 60 hour work week really isn't bad. 80 hours is doable for weeks at a time. 90+ sucks (general surgery and CT surgery as medical student where I had several 100 hour weeks. . . longest 9 weeks of my life).

 

[atomi]

What kind of lifestyle does one have as a medical resident? Do most medical residents buy houses or I'm assuming they do apartments during there time as residents and once residency is over make changes?

It can vary dramatically.
Some fields have very comfortable (on average, there are always still malignant programs that will work you harder) like derm, rad onc, pm&r, and psych where it is common for residents to work only 40 hour weeks or less and 50 hours+ is unusual.
Other fields, like surgery and surgical subspecialties, will work you over the 80 hour limit and essentially force you to falsify your hours.
Most residencies will be somewhere in between with 60-70 workweeks common. In general, lifestyle improves as you go along.

Regarding lifestyle, everyone's situation is different. Some residents are wealthy and can afford a nice house or condo on their own. Others have a working spouse. Others live in a low COL area where buying a house is totally reasonable on a resident's salary ($55-65k/year). Some residents are deeply indebted and rent and live with roommates. About half of residents are married and either have kids before they start residency or have kids during residency (it's that time after all as residents are typically aged 25-35).

 

[atomi]

I have always assumed the first few years of residency were worse than med school itseld

Correct, your PGY-1 year (intern year), will almost always be the worst year of your medical training (with the paradoxical exception of a very small number of transitional year programs where it's one of the best years -- I knew a guy who did one of these programs and played golf 2-3 afternoons a week). PGY-1 year is also the year where you learn the most (unless of course you do one of those TY years where you are essentially just killing time and all you're learning is what the insides of your eyelids look like -- a waste if you ask me).

 

[Tenk]

Residency sucks but it’s better than med school. Don’t buy a house unless you plan to live there after residency or the market is just amazing and you enjoy gambling with several hundred thousand dollars.

 

[Redpancreas]

What kind of lifestyle does one have as a medical resident? Do most medical residents buy houses or I'm assuming they do apartments during there time as residents and once residency is over make changes?

It varies per specialty. (If we were on SDN-Allo I’d assume medical resident meant IM resident, but not sure if you’re using it to mean generic resident or IM specifically). Regardless, I’m both, albeit a bit new so I’ll bite. Work hours are typically 70-80 hrs. a week (6-6 pm, one day off a week, layman’s weekend once a month as I have clinic every 5th week). You spend a majority of your time at work actually working which is a nice change of pace from medical school. A big burden for me was always work after class and preparing for standardized tests. With some of that lifted (there’s still Step 3 and ITE, but they don’t matter as much for fellowship), a great deal of my stress is gone and I am actually enjoying my time. That said, the work is harder and longer and if you want to specialize within IM, a good amount of time outside of residency is spent doing research, etc. and it can get overwhelming in other ways. Another challenge is that you’re still living on what’s basically a stipend that just covers living costs and a bit to pay off loans and that will continue for 3-8 years depending on how long you want to train in IM for. While 55K sounds good, a third goes to taxes and the take home amounts to $3000. The majority of that goes to loans, rent, and utilities.

Regarding the house, I don’t think it makes sense for a 3 year residency but if you plan to live there long term I guess it could make sense but I don’t think it’s worth the gamble especially with that sum of money. If you do Neurosurgery or another long/fixed residency, you’ll be spending 7 years in the same spot and it may make sense to buy a home. Anything over 5 and I’d consider purchasing property.

 

[jd989898]

Most residents don't have time to spend their money lol.

 

[mimelim]

PGY7 - vascular surgery

~90-110 hours/week on our home service, all inclusive of clinical duties, documentation, administration, research and conference prep. The content of what I do has changed as I have gone further, but the time commitment hasn't shifted much.
~60-80 hours/week while on other services, all inclusive

I would say that I work probably on average 10 hours/week more than my colleagues. Most of it is ambition, some of it is over anal retentiveness. We are one of the highest, if not the highest clinical volume program in the country, we are busy, always. Our service this weekend... 60+ patients, 40+ consults, 7 operations (waiting on OR right now for an ex-lap, mesenteric revascularization right now). As you progress further in your program, the end inches nearer and nearer, which is exciting because... $$$ and you know FREEDOM! (Mel Gibson) But, you also realize quickly how much there is always to learn. Which means you work harder and longer...

I bought my place before I started PGY1. Wonderful financial decision, but that was a very different housing market than now and I knew that I was going to be in the same place for at least 7 years...

 

[Eye-eye]

Correct, your PGY-1 year (intern year), will almost always be the worst year of your medical training (with the paradoxical exception of a very small number of transitional year programs where it's one of the best years -- I knew a guy who did one of these programs and played golf 2-3 afternoons a week). PGY-1 year is also the year where you learn the most (unless of course you do one of those TY years where you are essentially just killing time and all you're learning is what the insides of your eyelids look like -- a waste if you ask me).

Also in a lot of surgical specialties, your first full year on the actual surgical service, and where you start really learning all the basics of operating, is PGY-2. All the neurosurg residents at my institution say that PGY2 is the hardest for their specialty.

 

[TypeADissection]

You will definitely have a life in residency, although your expectations will have to change towards something more realistic. I went out a lot during med school. Lots of wing nights, lots of MNF, lots of quizzo. Nowadays if I can make it out for wing night on a bi-weekly basis that's great success. But this is coming from a surgery resident perspective. It seems like not much changed for my friends in peds, FM and IM. They definitely went out a lot.

 

[trobinsonmd]

What kind of lifestyle does one have as a medical resident? Do most medical residents buy houses or I'm assuming they do apartments during there time as residents and once residency is over make changes?

Really depends on the person and the city... if you want to end up working in the city you do your residency, there are several reasonable options for purchasing a home. I'm doing my residency in Manhattan, and I want to leave for CA as soon as I'm done, so I don't own a place (a decent apartment in my part of town starts at about a mil)... but several of my co residents that plan on staying in nyc own homes here... most of them are in long island city and they all got fha loans, which means the minimum downpayment is super low and the monthly payments are very comparable to what you would pay as your rent... so it is a great idea to buy a home if you plan on staying in the city long term so you can build equity in a property as opposed to paying rent and helping someone else build equity... of course, if you do not have long term plans to stay in your residency city, buying a house is still an option as you can rent it out when you move and supplement your income. A majority of people tend to rent though. wrt your lifestyle question, it really varies based on specialty

 

[RangerBob]

I had a blast in med school--you have so much free time to hand out with friends, do stuff during the week when places are less crowded, etc. Yes it gets busy at times, but then between exams things get light. And you get those great long vacations, especially in M1 and M2. But I also like school.

Intern year was a lot of fun too--busy, but you're finally practicing medicine.

Residency was great. I love PM&R, and our hours were great (generally about 60hrs/week PGY2, then 50hrs/week PGY3-4). Most residencies don't have hours like that, but derm, path, PM&R, and psych can have great lifestyles.

I bought a house in residency, but I don't recommend it. I actually had the time to work on the home (and I enjoyed it). Most residents don't. Stuff goes wrong with homes--the heater goes out, plumbing backs up, etc. If you can't fix it yourself, someone has to be there to let the contractor in. My monthly payment was about $800/month for mortgage/taxes/insurance, compared to about $1200 to rent a similar home. In the end, taking into account repairs, upgrades, closing costs, etc., it was actually a wash. A new heater and AC is pretty costly... But I did get a lot of cool tools and experience out of it. Still, not recommended for most.

 

[DoctorSwagger]

What kind of lifestyle does one have as a medical resident? Do most medical residents buy houses or I'm assuming they do apartments during there time as residents and once residency is over make changes?

*their


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[M1i]

PGY7 - vascular surgery

~90-110 hours/week on our home service, all inclusive of clinical duties, documentation, administration, research and conference prep. The content of what I do has changed as I have gone further, but the time commitment hasn't shifted much.
~60-80 hours/week while on other services, all inclusive

I would say that I work probably on average 10 hours/week more than my colleagues. Most of it is ambition, some of it is over anal retentiveness. We are one of the highest, if not the highest clinical volume program in the country, we are busy, always. Our service this weekend... 60+ patients, 40+ consults, 7 operations (waiting on OR right now for an ex-lap, mesenteric revascularization right now). As you progress further in your program, the end inches nearer and nearer, which is exciting because... $$$ and you know FREEDOM! (Mel Gibson) But, you also realize quickly how much there is always to learn. Which means you work harder and longer...

I bought my place before I started PGY1. Wonderful financial decision, but that was a very different housing market than now and I knew that I was going to be in the same place for at least 7 years...

Is the 90-110 hours as bad as it seems? Just reading it is intimidating. I’ve worked in management which was 50-60 hours and it wasn’t bad at all!
But that’s double the hours and it seems so daunting, I mean almost impossible. I feel I would be to tired to function, or function well (which I assume is important when you’re a physician).
Are these hours incredibly similar to GS

Ps would there be time for the gym.?

 

[mimelim]

Is the 90-110 hours as bad as it seems? Just reading it is intimidating. I’ve worked in management which was 50-60 hours and it wasn’t bad at all!
But that’s double the hours and it seems so daunting, I mean almost impossible. I feel I would be to tired to function, or function well (which I assume is important when you’re a physician).
Are these hours incredibly similar to GS

Ps would there be time for the gym.?

Yes, it is bad. Survivable, but you are very crunched for time. But, you can do other things, like the gym. It won't be as regular, but you make time and prioritize for the things that matter the most to you. You really can do anything, just not everything. I keep a fairly rigorous training schedule and workout/exercise 5-6 days a week. I've had to adapt to things that are much more flexible like running and the gym, rather than rock climbing, but it is what it is. It is important to keep in mind that not every program is the same as mine. For example, I'm waiting for my ride right now at 8pm having just finished my clinical duties. When I get home I need to finish a consult note. Then I need to finish editing a presentation for case conference tomorrow, ~ an hour of video editing, maybe 30 minutes of powerpoint and 30 minutes of literature review. Then I need to make the July call schedule. Then I need to prepare for the 8 cases that I have scheduled for tomorrow. Will eat dinner while working and finish around 11pm. Then get to sleep. I plan on running tomorrow morning, so I need to be awake by 415 so I can have enough time to run and then shower before my wife drops me off back at the hospital about 6am. Many nights I won't have all of this stuff to do, but if you have 3-4 nights a week, it adds up and you really have to pick and choose what you do.

 

[M1i]

Yes, it is bad. Survivable, but you are very crunched for time. But, you can do other things, like the gym. It won't be as regular, but you make time and prioritize for the things that matter the most to you. You really can do anything, just not everything. I keep a fairly rigorous training schedule and workout/exercise 5-6 days a week. I've had to adapt to things that are much more flexible like running and the gym, rather than rock climbing, but it is what it is. It is important to keep in mind that not every program is the same as mine. For example, I'm waiting for my ride right now at 8pm having just finished my clinical duties. When I get home I need to finish a consult note. Then I need to finish editing a presentation for case conference tomorrow, ~ an hour of video editing, maybe 30 minutes of powerpoint and 30 minutes of literature review. Then I need to make the July call schedule. Then I need to prepare for the 8 cases that I have scheduled for tomorrow. Will eat dinner while working and finish around 11pm. Then get to sleep. I plan on running tomorrow morning, so I need to be awake by 415 so I can have enough time to run and then shower before my wife drops me off back at the hospital about 6am. Many nights I won't have all of this stuff to do, but if you have 3-4 nights a week, it adds up and you really have to pick and choose what you do.

May I ask, does that 90-110 hours you quoted include the additional work duties you complete at home. Or is that on top of it? Also since you mention the wife, do you mind me asking, does she care that you work so much? (Obviously she wishes you didn’t have to. But does it result in any spousal difficulties.)
And if you haven’t been told lately. It’s very impressive what you do. Should be proud of yourself.

 

[mimelim]

May I ask, does that 90-110 hours you quoted include the additional work duties you complete at home. Or is that on top of it? Also since you mention the wife, do you mind me asking, does she care that you work so much? (Obviously she wishes you didn’t have to. But does it result in any spousal difficulties.)
And if you haven’t been told lately. It’s very impressive what you do. Should be proud of yourself.

Yes, when I say 90-110, I'm talking about everything that I need to do related to work, even if done from home. I don't include random orders or phone calls and I'm rather efficient with my paperwork, so it is rare that I need to do that from home.

My wife... Is a lawyer with her own career. She is a huge introvert and generally doesn't really miss me being around. She doesn't really mind the unpredictability either as long as we don't make firm plans. As long as I don't firm commit to something, she is okay with me being late to things. My wife is the best person that I know and one of the most even keeled and tolerant people I've met. That obviously allows me to be relatively cavalier in my career. But, beyond that, communication is key, setting appropriate expectations are key. Shared interests are key. We share a number of hobbies, so when I do have time free, we are always doing those together. I have given up most of my hobbies that she isn't involved in. Again, priorities. Certainly have been bumpy spots and I've seen a fair number of breakups and divorces among surgical residents around me.

Honestly, the biggest thing is that she is tolerant of my attitude. I'm available to my junior residents and patients. No, I don't run back to the hospital every time someone calls, but I will always answer my phone, regardless of time of day or when I'm on call. If nobody answers my phone, you should be worried. That is probably the hardest thing to handle for her or any spouse. She has to share me with my patients and my colleagues. She knows that she is my #1 priority and push comes to shove I pick her over all else. But, she also knows that this is who I am as an individual and she has learned (over the last 15 years) to handle it.

 

[Oso]

Me reading your posts:

PGY7

For example, I'm waiting for my ride right now at 8pm having just finished my clinical duties. When I get home I need to finish a consult note. Then I need to finish editing a presentation for case conference tomorrow, ~ an hour of video editing, maybe 30 minutes of powerpoint and 30 minutes of literature review. Then I need to make the July call schedule. Then I need to prepare for the 8 cases that I have scheduled for tomorrow. Will eat dinner while working and finish around 11pm. Then get to sleep. I plan on running tomorrow morning, so I need to be awake by 415 so I can have enough time to run and then shower before my wife drops me off back at the hospital about 6am

Much respect, bro. I could never (and would never want to) do what you do.