MD Lifestyle

Applying to Med School? Get In Or Your Money Back
This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.
L

luke77

Member
10+ Year Member
7+ Year Member
15+ Year Member
Joined
Mar 12, 2006
Messages
79
Reaction score
0
Hi Guys,
I just finished my first year out of college working in investment banking on Wall Street. Without a doubt, it was a horrible year, and I am planning on resigning soon. The work I am doing is actually very interesting to me, but I am working 75-80 hours a week on average, and I hate the lifestyle. I have always had an interest in medicine, and am particularly interested in psychiatry. However, I never again want to go through a year like I just finished. I am quite aware that many med student put in extremely hardcore hours during school, internship, and residency - and most doctors work fairly long hours as well. However, I know several doctors who have "lifestyle" jobs - for instance, one guy works at a university health center 4 days a week, 7-8 hours a day, and another guy I know works 3 12-hour days a week. I'm sure they don't make huge salaries, but this isn't so important to me.

My question is regarding medical school, internship, and residency. Is it possible to go to a school and do internship/residency and maintain a normal lifestyle, if you aren't a gunner? I'm not suggesting that I want to coast my way through med school or anything like that, but I'm wondering if I go to a non-top 25 school, aim to finish in the middle (or even lower half) of my class, and go into a psychiatry residency, is it possible to work 40-50 hours a week and maintain a normal life? I know this attitude is total anathema to the normal pre-med mindset, but the past year had taught me that there is much more to life than work. I'm not sure if this attitude will jive in the medical profession, so I'm interested in the thoughts of others.

Thanks,
Luke
Members don't see this ad.
 
From what i hear you will work the same amount of hours some being day and a half shifts unless you are in a private practice out of residency.
 
for residency, i do not believe it is possible to work significantly less than 80 hour weeks for the duration of the program. please someone correct me if i am wrong
 
Members don't see this ad :)
Kay, stupid question here...WHAT is a gunner? I see the term all over SDN, but I have no clue what it means...
 
I look forward to hearing what some people have to say because I am interested in pursuing a similar lifestyle. I don't want to graduate top of my class, I don't want a derm residency, I just want to be able to have a life and normal work hours. Salary is a non-issue for me.

I heard that the Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center offers residencies in radiology since they do outpatient procedures on a daily basis. One of my friends who researches there tells me that there is never anybody on call and that most of the medical staff just works 9-5 m-f. Seems like there is never any emergencies or times where residents would have to be awake for >24 hours.
 
a gunner (student) is a term used in medical school/law school to describe a hyper-competitive student (wikipedia:))
 
As long as you're in med school you would be having a pretty grueling schedule...I'm still a premed but I've read enough of these threads and I think the picture is quite clear...No way is anyone getting out easy...

It only gets more time consuming as you go even if you are simply trying to get it over with (passing exams, not trying to stay in the top half of the class etc.)....a 50 hour week might cut it...depending on how you spend those hours...whether you're efficient enough in that given time...

I do like your idea though...I'm thinking of a very similar future..But not too sure if med school would be easy on me...as long as I'd be in there (if i get admitted somewhere... :p) I'm sure I'm going to have to put in way more time than 50-60 hrs/week...
 
Regardless of what kind of lifestyle specialty you find post-residency, you will be doing the same 80ish hours a week through your residency, which is 3 years minimum for family practice, and the M3/M4 years are no cake walk for hours either. On top of all that you aren't making nearly the money you would be making as an I-banker. If you like what you're doing and it is simply the hours deterring you, then maybe medicine is not the place to look to. However, if you think you can suck it up for 5-6 years during your clinical/residency years... go for it. Just be sure to pay careful consideration to where you could be in 5 years on your current career path.
 
hants said:
a gunner (student) is a term used in medical school/law school to describe a hyper-competitive student (wikipedia:))
Click to expand...

It has an even more negative connotation than that. It is not someone who works hard and does well. It is someone who will compromise social relationships to do well. The guy who doesn't care whose head he steps on to get ahead. Who undermines classmates, tries to steer folks in the wrong direction, etc. You don't want to be a gunner.
 
Law2Doc said:
It has an even more negative connotation than that. It is not someone who works hard and does well. It is someone who will compromise social relationships to do well. The guy who doesn't care whose head he steps on to get ahead. Who undermines classmates, tries to steer folks in the wrong direction, etc. You don't want to be a gunner.
Click to expand...

Yes, the kind of person who will rig his labmates' experiments when they are not looking.
 
Spend a few years in I-Banking and you'll never have to worry about med school debt.
 
Members don't see this ad :)
I want to be a single Doctor for at least two years and hang out at Martini bars with blonde haired blue eyed ladies fitted with long red dresses. :)
 
and help make other people feel better.
 
OP, if oyu enjoy what you are doing then i would stick with it. the hours get easier with each year no? and the money is worth it i think. hell sometimes i think that if i coul;d do everything over again, i would try to land on wall street
 
luke77 said:
Hi Guys,
I just finished my first year out of college working in investment banking on Wall Street. Without a doubt, it was a horrible year, and I am planning on resigning soon. The work I am doing is actually very interesting to me, but I am working 75-80 hours a week on average, and I hate the lifestyle. I have always had an interest in medicine, and am particularly interested in psychiatry. However, I never again want to go through a year like I just finished. I am quite aware that many med student put in extremely hardcore hours during school, internship, and residency - and most doctors work fairly long hours as well. However, I know several doctors who have "lifestyle" jobs - for instance, one guy works at a university health center 4 days a week, 7-8 hours a day, and another guy I know works 3 12-hour days a week. I'm sure they don't make huge salaries, but this isn't so important to me.

My question is regarding medical school, internship, and residency. Is it possible to go to a school and do internship/residency and maintain a normal lifestyle, if you aren't a gunner? I'm not suggesting that I want to coast my way through med school or anything like that, but I'm wondering if I go to a non-top 25 school, aim to finish in the middle (or even lower half) of my class, and go into a psychiatry residency, is it possible to work 40-50 hours a week and maintain a normal life? I know this attitude is total anathema to the normal pre-med mindset, but the past year had taught me that there is much more to life than work. I'm not sure if this attitude will jive in the medical profession, so I'm interested in the thoughts of others.

Thanks,
Luke
Click to expand...

40-50 hours/week in psych is doable.

I would think long and hard though whether going back to undergrad for pre-reqs, taking the MCAT, applying, matriculating, doing the med school thing for four years, then being an intern -> resident -> attending is worth giving up your current job (which could start to pay-off and get more enjoyable in the next few years). If you can't see yourself doing anything else, maybe it's worth it. I'd think about it a lot though. I'm sure there are other options with your undergrad degree as well (MBA, etc).

Medical education is like indentured servitude and going into all that with the ultimate goal of a relaxing job and lifestyle is a bit risky.
 
ironically enough, alot of the specialties with the 'easier' lifestyles have very competitive residencies, meaning you have to do very well in med school to even qualify (dermatology, anesthesiology, radiology..)
 
Hey i have some of the same motivations as you. I considered ibanking also but I never took any econ/business classes or did any internships in that area. What really appealed about banking was that once you get to be an associate you can transfer to some international office.

but now that ive decided on medicine, it is my opinion that the best lifestyle fields are EM and radiology. let me explain this and i encourage anybody to add/disprove anything that i say:
1) EM-you can work 7 12-hr shifts on/7off at 1 practice. at a different one you can work 10months on, 2months off. You can also do locum-tenens in which you get paid the same rate as a permanently employed physician, that is $150/hr. This allows you to travel and to take as much time off as possible.

The other most interesting aspect of EM is a career as a ship cruise doctor. They get paid significantly less, about $100k/yr. But they work 4months on/2months off. And their room on the ship and food is free. and the salary is tax-free. Whats more important is that you may work about 20hrs/wk on the ship unless there is some kind of epidemic. And you can bring aboard your wives for something like $1/day.

2) Radiology. it is possible right now to have 15+ wks of vacation per year. maybe even more if you're willing to cut down your salary to EM level. The income and vacation time may go down in the future, who knows. But there is another interesting aspect. It is possible to do teleradiology, that is to work from your home...
 
The huge variety of physicians and medical specialities available means that a person can have any number of possibly schedules imaginable. The downside is that the speciality you choose may not allow such a schedule or the pay may not be that great for a light schedule.

For example, surgery will probably not allow you to have a 'normal' life. The surgeons I've spoken with work about 60 hr/wk. However, they love what they're doing, they know what they do is important, and they get compensated well for it.

But you don't have to be a surgeon. I've followed plenty of private practice doctors to know that plenty of them have 'normal' schedules. The psychiatrist I was with had a typical 45 hr/wk thing going. It was very laid back schedule and since she only did outpatient, she rarely had to worry about being oncall or working weekends/holidays. I doubt she's making a lot of money but she's comfortable.

Most doctors will work at least 50 hr/wk because they have to be oncall every week or every few weeks, and/or they have to round on their patients, many on Saturday mornings. The oncalls may be bad (i.e going into the hospital every time). Or it can be very light. For the PMR doc I spoke with, it just means being attached with a beeper and when someone pages you, you call and see if you can resolve the issue over the phone. At least a few doctors have told me when they were on call, it consisted of answering a few questions or having no one bothering at all. Others have said calls are exhausting. So it is speciality dependent, and practice dependent (are you dealing with chronically ill patients? outpatient care only? etc).

Also, professions such as ER will only do shift work. You work 40 hrs/week and you're done. ER docs actually make good money despite their fairly light schedule. I believe starting salary around where I live is about $180k.

However, I will warn you that if you want to avoid a career which has you working a lot of hours, medicine is probably not the best place to be. Yeah, you can work less, but medicine is not a hours-friendly profession in general. Also, during your residency years, you will be working many, many hours. Do medicine if you have a real interest. Don't do it for the lifestyle.

Also, I'd like to point out that some of the lifestyle friendly specialties are NOT hard to get into. Psych and path are fairly good lifestyle, so is neuro and ER. Anesthesia is not terribly competitive either. Aside from derm and radiology and opthalmology, the other regular hour specialities are generally not ubercompetitive as long as you don't mind the location of your residency.
 
I used to work at a compensation consulting firm, and I essentially helped hospitals decide how much to pay their physicians. We used a compensation model called a WRVU (Work Relative Value Unit). Basically, under this model, physicians get paid on units of work, not some preset salary, and as a result, had quite a bit of latitude to set their own hours. One of our hospital clients had a work culture where four day weeks are the norm. An exception, no doubt, but if you look for such, you'll find it. Plus, psychiatry is known for a good lifestyle ;)
 
coldweatherblue said:
40-50 hours/week in psych is doable.

I would think long and hard though whether going back to undergrad for pre-reqs, taking the MCAT, applying, matriculating, doing the med school thing for four years, then being an intern -> resident -> attending is worth giving up your current job (which could start to pay-off and get more enjoyable in the next few years). If you can't see yourself doing anything else, maybe it's worth it. I'd think about it a lot though. I'm sure there are other options with your undergrad degree as well (MBA, etc).

Medical education is like indentured servitude and going into all that with the ultimate goal of a relaxing job and lifestyle is a bit risky.
Click to expand...

40 hours/week is not a realistic number of hours for a professional. In some specialties that is even considered part-time. The AVERAGE post-residency hours for most specialties is 60 hours/week. During residency you may average closer to 80. By law you can't average more anymore, although some programs push the limits and even with an 80 hour average there will be some weeks where you may break 100 in the more intense fields. Surgeons do a lot more, dermatologists, and folks in things like psych may do a bit less. But I think it's pretty dangerous to mention numbers like 40 hours/week on premed boards because few if any of you are going to see those kind of hours as a professional. Medicine is not a 9-5 field. More often it's a 7-7 field with occasional weekends and call nights. Sure some psychiatrists may post-residency set up shop in a solo practice where they set their own schedule, but by doing so they take on a lot of administrative and marketing responsibilities, and the amount they can earn (after insurance reimbursement) is going to make them pretty broke if they choose to only work 9-5.
 
mumiitroll said:
Hey i have some of the same motivations as you. I considered ibanking also but I never took any econ/business classes or did any internships in that area. What really appealed about banking was that once you get to be an associate you can transfer to some international office.

but now that ive decided on medicine, it is my opinion that the best lifestyle fields are EM and radiology. let me explain this and i encourage anybody to add/disprove anything that i say:
1) EM-you can work 7 12-hr shifts on/7off at 1 practice. at a different one you can work 10months on, 2months off. You can also do locum-tenens in which you get paid the same rate as a permanently employed physician, that is $150/hr. This allows you to travel and to take as much time off as possible.

The other most interesting aspect of EM is a career as a ship cruise doctor. They get paid significantly less, about $100k/yr. But they work 4months on/2months off. And their room on the ship and food is free. and the salary is tax-free. Whats more important is that you may work about 20hrs/wk on the ship unless there is some kind of epidemic. And you can bring aboard your wives for something like $1/day.

2) Radiology. it is possible right now to have 15+ wks of vacation per year. maybe even more if you're willing to cut down your salary to EM level. The income and vacation time may go down in the future, who knows. But there is another interesting aspect. It is possible to do teleradiology, that is to work from your home...
Click to expand...

haha. Good to know. My wives would get bored sitting at home by themselves
 
Law2Doc said:
40 hours/week is not a realistic number of hours for a professional. In some specialties that is even considered part-time. The AVERAGE post-residency hours for most specialties is 60 hours/week. During residency you may average closer to 80. By law you can't average more anymore, although some programs push the limits and even with an 80 hour average there will be some weeks where you may break 100 in the more intense fields. Surgeons do a lot more, dermatologists, and folks in things like psych may do a bit less. But I think it's pretty dangerous to mention numbers like 40 hours/week on premed boards because few if any of you are going to see those kind of hours as a professional. Medicine is not a 9-5 field. More often it's a 7-7 field with occasional weekends and call nights. Sure some psychiatrists may post-residency set up shop in a solo practice where they set their own schedule, but by doing so they take on a lot of administrative and marketing responsibilities, and the amount they can earn (after insurance reimbursement) is going to make them pretty broke if they choose to only work 9-5.
Click to expand...

Alright, I'm the OP, following up on this post. Responses like these are the reason for my question - this is pretty much what I expected. However, I've come to realize that the kind of people that post on message boards are among the most driven, and my question is whether it is possible to be "non-driven" and have a decent lifestyle. If the answer is "No, not in medicine", that's fine, I'm willing to accept that - but it seems to me that the data contradict your statements. I wasn't aware of the FREIDA site before this post, but it seems to confirm some of my suspicions.

For instance, here are the average work hours given for PY1 in allergy:44.6; nuclear medicine: 45.5, genetics: 43.2, etc. etc. Sure, many of the other specialties have much higher hours, around 60-75/week, but even specialties like psychiatry and radiology are around 50-55/week. And these are hours during PY1, supposedly the worst year hours-wise of one's medical career. AND these are averages, meaning that if you choose carefully (read: less competitive hospitals), some programs will have fewer hours.

So, I can only conclude one of two things from this data: either people like Law2Doc are overstating things due to their experience in more competitive fields (or with more competitive people), or these data are incorrect. I've seen this in my own experience in banking: I work around 75-80 hours a week, but I work at a top firm in NYC, and if you ask my colleagues, they'll probably say that they average 90 hour weeks, simply because it is human nature to overstate things like this. At most top firms the average work week is truly about 80 hours a week, but if you are willing to go to a less "desirable" city, work at a 2nd or 3rd tier firm for less money, you can work in banking and work 40-60 hours a week. This is not the image most people have in their minds when it comes to banking, though.

So, to restate and ask my question again, is the data on FREIDA accurate, or is it truly impossible to become a doctor without working crazy hours? I'd love to hear personal experiences from people in some of the fields I mentioned (allergy, nuclear medicine, genetics, even psychiatry or radiology). Perhaps I should post this in the med students forum or a physicians forum as well?

Thanks again.
 
luke77 said:
Alright, I'm the OP, following up on this post. Responses like these are the reason for my question - this is pretty much what I expected. However, I've come to realize that the kind of people that post on message boards are among the most driven, and my question is whether it is possible to be "non-driven" and have a decent lifestyle. If the answer is "No, not in medicine", that's fine, I'm willing to accept that - but it seems to me that the data contradict your statements. I wasn't aware of the FREIDA site before this post, but it seems to confirm some of my suspicions.

For instance, here are the average work hours given for PY1 in allergy:44.6; nuclear medicine: 45.5, genetics: 43.2, etc. etc. Sure, many of the other specialties have much higher hours, around 60-75/week, but even specialties like psychiatry and radiology are around 50-55/week. And these are hours during PY1, supposedly the worst year hours-wise of one's medical career. AND these are averages, meaning that if you choose carefully (read: less competitive hospitals), some programs will have fewer hours.

So, I can only conclude one of two things from this data: either people like Law2Doc are overstating things due to their experience in more competitive fields (or with more competitive people), or these data are incorrect. I've seen this in my own experience in banking: I work around 75-80 hours a week, but I work at a top firm in NYC, and if you ask my colleagues, they'll probably say that they average 90 hour weeks, simply because it is human nature to overstate things like this. At most top firms the average work week is truly about 80 hours a week, but if you are willing to go to a less "desirable" city, work at a 2nd or 3rd tier firm for less money, you can work in banking and work 40-60 hours a week. This is not the image most people have in their minds when it comes to banking, though.

So, to restate and ask my question again, is the data on FREIDA accurate, or is it truly impossible to become a doctor without working crazy hours? I'd love to hear personal experiences from people in some of the fields I mentioned (allergy, nuclear medicine, genetics, even psychiatry or radiology). Perhaps I should post this in the med students forum or a physicians forum as well?

Thanks again.
Click to expand...

Careful with how you read (misread) Freida. Nuclear Medicine and Radiology, for instance are "advanced" programs. Meaning there is no "PY-1" year in those (at least for 90% of the programs -- there are a few 5 year programs but not many) -- you first have to do a year of IM or Surgery as your initial year, and only then do you start in on those specialties. So check out what Freida says about those programs to see what you are going to be doing. Second, you have to be careful as to what the "sign-in to sign-out" hours are as compared to the actual hours. You may be on the books at the 45 or so hours listed, but may very well be coming in an hour or two earlier and leaving an hour or two later each day, just to seem "on the ball" and to get your paperwork done. There are also a variety of mandatory lectures and conferences that may or may not be included in these hours. For example, your work day may officially start at 9, but you are expected to attend mandatory morning conference at 7:30 each day. That's kind of the major flaw of these listings. It's sort of like football time -- there may be only 60 minutes on the clock each game, but the actual game last 3 hours. But you don't really care how much time folks are officially on the books, you care about the time from when you leave your house to when you get home. And I'm telling you it's going to be above the 40 hour work week, and probably A LOT above it. Also bear in mind that you will have Step 3, and various specialty specific boards to study for, so when you leave work for the day, your work is not always done.

As far as your ultimate question, "is it possible to be "non-driven" and have a decent lifestyle", the answer depends on what you consider "decent" but probably the answer is "not so much". You either work really hard in med school and get yourself into one of the lifestyle fields where you won't have to work as hard down the road, or you don't work that hard in med school, but continue to have to crank out office visits many hours a day to make a decent living. In fields like psych, FP, and other primary care fields, you live on reimbursements from insurance companies, and so the more hours you spend on patients, the more money you can earn. This translates to having to work more hours to earn a "decent" living, because the insurance companies are always lowering reimbursements year after year, driving the hours up year after year. In the lifestyle fields, where procedures are better compensated, you may not have to work as hard down the road (and that still means in the 50+ hour range, not the 40+ hour range in most cases), but you will bust your hump in med school getting there. Either way, neither your third year of med school nor your residency is going to be a cake-walk for any path, no matter what you read on Frieda. If anyone talks about easy lifestyles and light workload in a professional field, be really skeptical. EM is probably the one exception I know, because they tend to limit folks to 3-4 shifts of 12 hours per week by convention. But when you are just starting out, you'd better believe a lot of those shifts are going to be overnights.

This is a hard working profession. You will work long hours at times. Sorry if that's a revelation or if you somehow think the folks on pre-allo have a better bead on this than folks further along. But I think it's probably realistic to figure you will be working in the 70-80 hour range during residency and the 60-70 hour range thereafter in the average physician job. So figure something like 7-7 with periodic weekends and overnights right after residency is the norm. As a surgeon you will do more. Some of the lifestyle fields, you may do less. But not a whole lot less. There are some great things about medicine, but the hours are not really one of them. Good luck.
 
Last edited:
Thank you for your post, Luke. It was interesting to finally see a positive perspective on this board.

For the record, I'm a pre-med, so my words should taken with the understanding that I'm still new to this process.

I shadow a pediatric specialist in a semi-urban environment. He has a relaxed schedule, seeing patients 2-3 days a week. He enjoys part time research projects which get published every few years. He has a moderately good income, >120,000 per year and plenty of time off ==> but he also did not have loans to pay off in entering residency because he did his degree in another country. If you have no loans to pay off, $120,000 is a rather good salary. Dr. X has said that his residency was pure, utter overworked hell and that the lengths of residencies/fellowships (in years) are only getting longer these days (he has a daughter who is also a pediatric specialist).

I'm not sure about residency schedules, but I imagine that the struggle to pay off med school loans subsequent to residency more or less forces physicians to survive semi-unendurable hours. The less $$ you take out in loans, the better you'll survive afterwards.

So someone's living a decent life as a physician; whether it's possible to accomplish this now or not is apparently a matter of debate. My best friend's brother is an IM resident and he's said that 'cushy' residencies do in fact exist, but that they are hard to come by --> clearly, I need to look into this and see if it's true.

Anyway, good luck. :luck:
 
luke,
It is possible to have normal workweek hours for a physician, but I honestly doubt it's worth it to go through all your premed reqs, MCAT, application process, med school, and residency starting now (assuming you don't have any of these things yet). You mentioned psychiatry, which has some of the most normal hours of any medical field (but also usually doesn't have as high of a salary). It all depends on what you do. If you do outpatient child psych, you're looking at normal hours and a good salary, depending on location. My attending on my rotation worked at the VA, put in 45 hours a week + once a week call from home, which isn't bad at all. Other fields can also offer normal hours (with a corresponding drop in salary), but you should understand that to get to this point you have to go through a residency in which you regularly work a lot of hours. Even in psychiatry you're going to have weeks where you're pushing 80 hours and weeks where you're closer to 50, not counting outside reading time and conferences. Whether or not all of this is worth it is completely up to you.
 
Luke have you considered being a nurse. RN's often have schedules like the 3-4 day, 12 hours a day you said.
 
Thanks for the responses. Just to clarify, I've done all my prereqs (I majored in science) but yes, I'd have to prepare for the MCAT and get some volunteer time in if I wanted to go to med school.

I still have to say that I find it a bit hard to believe, Law2Doc, that when the AVERAGE PY1 hours for certain specialties are listed at around 45, that you say that they are really working much more than that - particularly when average reported hours for the more hardcore specialties are up around 75, which sounds about right. Especially when you say that it's realistic to expect 60-70 hours a week once you are an established physician, because it tells me that you are not either not addressing the question or have a skewed view of reality, since I know for a fact that many, many physicians work far fewer hours than this. Remember, the question was "Is it possible to go in with the goal of maintaining a decent lifestyle throughout", and you're answer is essentially, "No, because the average doctor works 60-70 hours a week". I believe you are probably close to correct, although I think 60-70is a bit overstated, just as I believe that the average resident probably puts in 70-80 hours a week. I'm not interested in the "average", though; I'd like to know if it's possible to get to where the pediatric specialist who pianola mentioned (for example) is, without going through the hell of 70-80 hour weeks during residency. I am still not clear on this...
 
luke77 said:
I still have to say that I find it a bit hard to believe, Law2Doc, that when the AVERAGE PY1 hours for certain specialties are listed at around 45, that you say that they are really working much more than that
Click to expand...
Just to clarify, the specialties you mentioned are actually fellowships (allergy, genetics). They may be closer to 45 hours (though that surprises me if that were the case). So they're not actually pgy1, they're more like pgy4-6. And allergy/imm is one of the more competitive peds specialties.
 
From everything I've read and been told, if you're looking to slack off in your professional life, your ability to do so will be strongly correlated with your performance in med school and on Step exams. You'll need to kick butt to keep your options open for the residencies of your choosing. That's going to entail working at least 4 more years of those 70 hour weeks you hate.
 
luke77 said:
Thanks for the responses. Just to clarify, I've done all my prereqs (I majored in science) but yes, I'd have to prepare for the MCAT and get some volunteer time in if I wanted to go to med school.

I still have to say that I find it a bit hard to believe, Law2Doc, that when the AVERAGE PY1 hours for certain specialties are listed at around 45, that you say that they are really working much more than that - particularly when average reported hours for the more hardcore specialties are up around 75, which sounds about right. Especially when you say that it's realistic to expect 60-70 hours a week once you are an established physician, because it tells me that you are not either not addressing the question or have a skewed view of reality, since I know for a fact that many, many physicians work far fewer hours than this. Remember, the question was "Is it possible to go in with the goal of maintaining a decent lifestyle throughout", and you're answer is essentially, "No, because the average doctor works 60-70 hours a week". I believe you are probably close to correct, although I think 60-70is a bit overstated, just as I believe that the average resident probably puts in 70-80 hours a week. I'm not interested in the "average", though; I'd like to know if it's possible to get to where the pediatric specialist who pianola mentioned (for example) is, without going through the hell of 70-80 hour weeks during residency. I am still not clear on this...
Click to expand...

The answer is no. If it was possible, don't you think we would all be doing it? The thing that you don't seem to understand is that in medicine we all have to go through the same things, if your school is "highly competitive" or not, you still have to study to pass. There are times when you will be required to work more than you want just to get through school. Even the third year med students who are aiming for "Passes" still have to take call and are required to come in and round on their patients in the morning. You can't choose the "do less and just get a lower grade" option. Besides, since you will be responsible for patients someday, you probably won't end up wanting that anyway.

Here's one thing that stands out in a previous post of yours that suggests that you are thinking about this the wrong way. You asked if you didn't get into a top program, wouldn't the hours be better, because it wouldn't be "competitive." The answer to that is no, and here's the reason. EVERYONE wants a nice lifestyle and a nice salary. So, the specialties with the nicest lifestyle (or that people THINK have a nice lifestyle) are usually more competitve. And if the salary is also high, watch out! That's the deal with Derm. The top students from the top schools aren't actually all fascinated with skin. So, if you don't work hard and you match at a lower tiered program, you usually end up working harder because the more competitive students don't want to work hard either and don't go to them.

Another mistake you're making is that you think residents overestimate their hours. They don't. In fact, at many programs, usually in the surgical fields, they underreport because if they told the truth (that they often work 90-100 hours a week) their programs would lose accreditation. So honestly, FRIEDA is a guideline but not the absolute truth.

Now as for psychiatry, it is a field with lower hours overall. Depends on your program of course, and people in all fields take call at least some point in their career since as a physician you are responsible for your patients (or someone is covering for you.) In residency, you have to do 6 months of medicine/neuro and during that time you will likely work 80 hr weeks (or more unofficially). Likely after that is done, hours will go down, but again, depends on your program, at for at least some of it, you will have call. Once residency is done, some people in psychiatry work really hard and make more money. It is possible to work part time, overhead in a private practice setting is low and there is a large demand, which are all things that not many other fields can say. You have to LIKE psychiatry though and many people don't.

If you want to be a physician, go for it. Just know that if you are choosing medicine because you want a laid back lifestyle, you may be disappointed.

PS Peds specialists don't make much money in the grand scheme of things (ie salary doesn't usually go up much from general peds and can go down) and MUST complete a peds residency, which has many 80hr weeks.
 
Wednesday said:
PS Peds specialists don't make much money in the grand scheme of things (ie salary doesn't usually go up much from general peds and can go down) and MUST complete a peds residency, which has many 80hr weeks.
Click to expand...

Truth. These days, it will take 6 years AFTER medical school to start practicing as a pediatric specialist. (3 residency, 3 fellowship). Or so I'm told.
 
ar2388 said:
for residency, i do not believe it is possible to work significantly less than 80 hour weeks for the duration of the program. please someone correct me if i am wrong
Click to expand...

You are wrong. I work, per month, as a third year Emergency Medicine resident 14 eight-hour shifts and four 12-hour shifts which comes out to about 45 hours per week if you count conferences and other mandatory residency functions.

It all depends on your specialty.
 
HurricaneKatt said:
Kay, stupid question here...WHAT is a gunner? I see the term all over SDN, but I have no clue what it means...
Click to expand...

A gunner is a student who is so competitive he/she seeks to do well by hurting the academic performance of others (giving false information, changing pins on practicals, etc.)
 
Good ole uncle panda bear keeping it real.
 
Thanks again, everyone, for the responses. I'm not trying to be combative, really, it's just hard to get a true picture of what things are like (or could be like, if you choose the right path) when you have on the one hand guys like Law2Doc saying that you can't get by working reasonable hours, and on the other hand guys like Panda Bear saying he works 45 hours a week as a resident. I'm only being so persistent because I really would enjoy practicing medicine...I just don't want to commit to something that is going to put me through a year like this past year, which really was hellish. I suppose if I'm so concerned about working hours perhaps medicine is not for me... it just seems that there are no career paths that are interesting and intellectually stimulating, but you can still work 40 hours a week...
 
luke77 said:
Thanks again, everyone, for the responses. I'm not trying to be combative, really, it's just hard to get a true picture of what things are like (or could be like, if you choose the right path) when you have on the one hand guys like Law2Doc saying that you can't get by working reasonable hours, and on the other hand guys like Panda Bear saying he works 45 hours a week as a resident. I'm only being so persistent because I really would enjoy practicing medicine...I just don't want to commit to something that is going to put me through a year like this past year, which really was hellish. I suppose if I'm so concerned about working hours perhaps medicine is not for me... it just seems that there are no career paths that are interesting and intellectually stimulating, but you can still work 40 hours a week...
Click to expand...

I forgot to mention that half of those shifts are of the 10PM to 6AM variety or 6PM to 6AM. Whether you consider those kind of hours "reasonable" is a debatable. I happen to like shift work but a string of night shifts can wear you out. I would also mention that in my long work history which includes everything from fast food to engineering, while the hours may be good, I have never worked so hard as I do when I am working a typical shift in the Emergency Department. I realize that migrant workers picking fruit probably work harder but the norm for Emergency Medicine is continuous frenzied activity from the first to the last minute of a shift with no breaks at all.

Not complaining, just pointing it out to those who think Emergency Medicine is a "lifestyle" specialty.

As for medical school, the hours are only really grueling during third year and parts of fourth year. First and second year are only as grueling as you make them.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
luke77 said:
Thanks again, everyone, for the responses. I'm not trying to be combative, really, it's just hard to get a true picture of what things are like (or could be like, if you choose the right path) when you have on the one hand guys like Law2Doc saying that you can't get by working reasonable hours, and on the other hand guys like Panda Bear saying he works 45 hours a week as a resident. I'm only being so persistent because I really would enjoy practicing medicine...I just don't want to commit to something that is going to put me through a year like this past year, which really was hellish. I suppose if I'm so concerned about working hours perhaps medicine is not for me... it just seems that there are no career paths that are interesting and intellectually stimulating, but you can still work 40 hours a week...
Click to expand...

If you look back to my last post I did say EM was the "one exception" but that the hours you start out working are largely overnights, so as Panda points out you really don't call this a "lifestyle" field. I see no conflict. You now have a med student and several residents posting on here, giving you largely consistent advice. There are no easy shortcuts here. If you don't like working hard the professions are simply bad choices. If you are looking for an "easier" path than your I-banking experience, then the medical profession probably isn't going to be a good solution. Sorry.

I am surprised by how many posts like this crop up on pre-allo actually. Folks who ask, is there any way to be a doctor if you don't like to work hard. This is a long path to a long houred profession. Part of the reason compensation is decent in medicine is because of these factors. Part of the reason divorce and substance abuse rates are high in medicine is because of these factors. This isn't a cake and ice-cream party. As mentioned above, if there was a way to earn a lot of money without working very hard in medicine, everyone would want to do it, and it would quickly become extremely competitive (to some extent this is why derm is so competitive).

Medicine isn't hard because people want it to be that way. It's hard because you have to learn a ton in a very short period of time, and then go on to residency where your hours are exploitative because hospitals need your services as much as you need the training, and then it's hard because insurance companies dictate how much each patient/procedure is worth to you and so to earn more you need to spend more time on each. Can you work 40 hours a week (ie part time) in some specialties? Sure. I know eg pediatricians who have kids only work 4 days a week. But they earn less than six digits and have given up all chances of advancement in their partnerships for this privilege. Other people make similar sacrifices if they want fewer hours. And solo practice types may set their own hours, but if you are in solo practice you have to handle administrative stuff, accounting, paperwork beyond that of a larger practice and this cuts into your bottom line in a big way -- most have to work longish hours to earn decent money, because in medicine you don't get to set your rates, the insurance industry does this through reimbursements which are rarely as much as you value your own time, and are always on the decline. As mentioned above EM hours are lower than most, but when you are starting out, they are largely overnight, and so not a great solution for many. And of course things like derm or optho have nice hours post residency (but go through a year of IM or surgery as a prelim year), but only a tiny fraction (2-4 people) in each med school class get into such things, so you really don't want to bank on it as a reason to attend med school.

So the great majority of all physicians are going to find that they have to go through an oppressive residency and emerge into a 60 hour work week, give or take. Once in practice, you will likely come in very early in the morning, and get home for a late dinner. you will take your turn working on the weekend or overnight each month. Probably not all that different hours than I had in law, or you (OP) had in I-banking. But perhaps more active, because being on-call in the hospital isn't as relaxing as sitting at the printer's all night, waiting for an offering prospectus. And hopefully more interesting. Because interesting is really what medicine has to offer over those other options. You won't work less, you probably won't earn more. But if you enjoy it more, and don't hate coming in to work each morning, that's huge. And it's really all you are going to potentially get out of this career change if you make it. Not cushy hours for great money. This isn't a coasting path.
 
Last edited:
Ok, check it out. And I swear I'm not trolling. Medicine has become my thing, you know? The thing I'm great at, sort of like how Phelps and Bolt are great at what they do. You're going to laugh, but this semi-serious post in the Surgery forums (I was a bored little pre-med :D) got me all excited:

"What makes a surgeon excellent is an unceasing drive to be the most badass mofo the world has ever known, and having the confidence to do the most badass stuff that would make everyone else's scrotum shrivel in fear. It is someone who knows more than anyone else and can do things that no one else can do, because they have read more, studied more, practiced more, and pushed the boundaries more than anyone else. There is no shortcut to being an excellent surgeon and the vast majority of surgeons fall short."

That's the kind of thing that would make me excited to get up in the morning and go to work (which is just another chance to get better at what I do and incidentally improve the lives of some people along the way). I mean, I might not decide on surgery during medical school but from all I've seen, heard, and experienced thus far, I think surgery is for me. I have a track record of settling for mediocre and I've always been dissatisfied and unfulfilled...and I'm ready to pursue greatness. I don't care much about money or recognition or any of those external rewards: I just want to be content in knowing that I've done everything in my power to reach the pinnacle in my career, and if someone brings me their sick loved one and my intervention fails, I have no regrets because I have done my absolute best to reach my full potential. Feel free to stop and correct me, as I realize how totally naive I sound (it sounds like I'd be riding a magical unicorn to the hospital), but I think if I immerse myself in an exciting career the hours and pay will make no difference so long as they meet a minimal threshold. Otherwise, I might as well do dentistry and go for lifestyle. That's why I'm asking this question now, at this stage, as a premed. Why toss myself into medicine for lifestyle reasons when I can easily achieve those by becoming a dentist?

So my question is this: is it feasible to be this dedicated to my field, pushing its boundaries, and still have a meaningful relationship with my family? I hope it's not one of those "you can't have it all" things. We've all heard the "Where do you hide a surgeon's paycheck?" joke (fyi, tape it to his kid's forehead). The OP is right by saying there's a lot more to life than work, and I'm willing to sacrifice only so much. I understand and accept that there will be unpredictable call schedules and possibly 80+ hour work weeks (off the logs), but is my fantasy life impossible? I know I'm not going to be coaching little league, but will my kids have stranger anxiety everytime they see me during the divorce proceedings?

Hopefully the wise Law2Doc can chime in. Thanks.
 
Last edited:
Virgil said:
So my question is this: is it feasible to be this dedicated to my field, pushing its boundaries, and still have a meaningful relationship with my family? I hope it's not one of those "you can't have it all" things. We've all heard the "Where do you hide a surgeon's paycheck?" joke (fyi, tape it to his kid's forehead). The OP is right by saying there's a lot more to life than work, and I'm willing to sacrifice only so much. I understand and accept that there will be unpredictable call schedules and possibly 80+ hour work weeks (off the logs), but is my fantasy life impossible? I know I'm not going to be coaching little league, but will my kids have stranger anxiety everytime they see me during the divorce proceedings?

Hopefully the wise Law2Doc can chime in. Thanks.
Click to expand...

It's all about trying to find balance. You are going to work long hours in surgery for sure, no way around that. So you have to find a way to squeeze in that which is truly important into the small handful of hours a week you are not at the hospital. There are more hours in the week than the 80ish per week you will spend at the hospital and the 40ish per week you will spend asleep. So you need to use them wisely and appropriately. But don't kid yourself. There will be weeks when you will exceed 80 hours during a surgical residency and not have this excess time. And post-residency, you won't have this 80 hour protection anymore and there are certainly a lot of surgeons who regularly break 100 at that stage. So something has to give. Most surgeons do have families and manage to squeeze in quality time (albeit not quantity time). But by the same token, I know at least one physician who repeatedly blames his strained relationship with his kids on his career path. And I've been to more than a few dinners and events where a surgeon's spouse/family had to find an alternative way home because the doc got emergently called away to the hospital. Expect to work hard in medicine and have to work hard for everything else outside not to fall apart or by the wayside. But some certainly do manage to keep all the balls in the air.
 
Law2Doc said:
I am surprised by how many posts like this crop up on pre-allo actually. Folks who ask, is there any way to be a doctor if you don't like to work hard. This is a long path to a long houred profession. Part of the reason compensation is decent in medicine is because of these factors. Part of the reason divorce and substance abuse rates are high in medicine is because of these factors. This isn't a cake and ice-cream party. As mentioned above, if there was a way to earn a lot of money without working very hard in medicine, everyone would want to do it, and it would quickly become extremely competitive (to some extent this is why derm is so competitive). Medicine isn't hard because people want it to be that way. It's hard because you have to learn a ton in a very short period of time, and then go on to residency where your hours are exploitative because hospitals need your services as much as you need the training, and then it's hard because insurance companies dictate how much each patient/procedure is worth to you and so to earn more you need to spend more time on each. Can you work 40 hours a week (ie part time) in some specialties? Sure. I know eg pediatricians who have kids only work 4 days a week. But they earn less than six digits and have given up all chances of advancement in their partnerships for this privilege. Other people make similar sacrifices if they want fewer hours. And solo practice types may set their own hours, but if you are in solo practice you have to handle administrative stuff, accounting, paperwork beyond that of a larger practice and this cuts into your bottom line in a big way -- most have to work longish hours to earn decent money, because in medicine you don't get to set your rates, the insurance industry does this through reimbursements which are rarely as much as you value your own time, and are always on the decline. As mentioned above EM hours are lower than most, but when you are starting out, they are largely overnight, and so not a great solution for many. And of course things like derm or optho have nice hours post residency (but go through a year of IM or surgery as a prelim year), but only a tiny fraction (2-4 people) in each med school class get into such things, so you really don't want to bank on it as a reason to attend med school. So the great majority of all physicians are going to find that they have to go through an oppressive residency and emerge into a 60 hour work week, give or take. Once in practice, you will likely come in very early in the morning, and get home for a late dinner. you will take your turn working on the weekend or overnight each month. Probably not all that different hours than I had in law, or you (OP) had in I-banking. But perhaps more active, because being on-call in the hospital isn't as relaxing as sitting at the printer's all night, waiting for an offering prospectus. And hopefully more interesting. Because interesting is really what medicine has to offer over those other options. You won't work less, you probably won't earn more. But if you enjoy it more, and don't hate coming in to work each morning, that's huge. And it's really all you are going to potentially get out of this career change if you make it. Not cushy hours for great money. This isn't a coasting path.
Click to expand...

Paragraphs: use 'em.
 
luke77 said:
Hi Guys,
I just finished my first year out of college working in investment banking on Wall Street. Without a doubt, it was a horrible year, and I am planning on resigning soon. The work I am doing is actually very interesting to me, but I am working 75-80 hours a week on average, and I hate the lifestyle. I have always had an interest in medicine, and am particularly interested in psychiatry. However, I never again want to go through a year like I just finished. I am quite aware that many med student put in extremely hardcore hours during school, internship, and residency - and most doctors work fairly long hours as well. However, I know several doctors who have "lifestyle" jobs - for instance, one guy works at a university health center 4 days a week, 7-8 hours a day, and another guy I know works 3 12-hour days a week. I'm sure they don't make huge salaries, but this isn't so important to me.

My question is regarding medical school, internship, and residency. Is it possible to go to a school and do internship/residency and maintain a normal lifestyle, if you aren't a gunner? I'm not suggesting that I want to coast my way through med school or anything like that, but I'm wondering if I go to a non-top 25 school, aim to finish in the middle (or even lower half) of my class, and go into a psychiatry residency, is it possible to work 40-50 hours a week and maintain a normal life? I know this attitude is total anathema to the normal pre-med mindset, but the past year had taught me that there is much more to life than work. I'm not sure if this attitude will jive in the medical profession, so I'm interested in the thoughts of others.

Thanks,
Luke
Click to expand...

There are times during 3rd year in required clinical rotations where you'd be expected to work upwards of 80 hours (and sometimes beyond since med students aren't bound by the same rules that residents are), but other than that I don't think you'd ever work that much while in medical school. If you want to go into a specialty that works relatively few hours then your residency may reflect that to a certain extent. Check this page out:
http://www0.ama-assn.org/vapp/freida/srch/
Look up some residency programs in the specialty you're interested in and see what their max hours/wk, average hours/wk, beeper call, etc entail. There are some specialties where during residency you may only work somewhere around in the 50-60 hour range which is not that much different than many white collar professional jobs. And yes doctors still make decent $ even if they work 3 12-hour shifts in a week (in some specialties probably more than many investment bankers do on a $/hr basis)
 
kdburton said:
Check this page out:
http://www0.ama-assn.org/vapp/freida/srch/
Look up some residency programs in the specialty you're interested in and see what their max hours/wk, average hours/wk, beeper call, etc entail. There are some specialties where during residency you may only work somewhere around in the 50-60 hour range which is not that much different than many white collar professional jobs.
Click to expand...

The Frieda site was discussed above (both by me and a resident) and for the reasons described above it tends to underestimate hours badly in many cases. I sure wouldn't rely on those hours as gospel. That's actually the big shortcoming with that site.
 
Law2Doc said:
The Frieda site was discussed above (both by me and a resident) and for the reasons described above it tends to underestimate hours badly in many cases. I sure wouldn't rely on those hours as gospel. That's actually the big shortcoming with that site.
Click to expand...

Good point. I think a good thing to do would be to get ahold of current residents in programs that you'd be looking at as a M4 and ask them what their life is like. I was talking to some EM residents at a hospital assoc w/ my school and my friend who is a psych resident and they all seemed like they had quite a bit of free time during residency as compared to residents in other programs. Frieda may not be a good source, but there are reliable sources out there (current residents) who don't work 70-80 hrs/wk
 
Haha, I was gonna say, some of the pediatric residencies are 45-60 hours on average with compensation ranging from 45-56k per year (PGY1). That seems too good to be true, to me... Subspecialties WHILE working with KIDS with REGULAR PERSON hours? Way too good to be true... ;-)
 
This is one of the best threads on here right now. I love all the passionate battling and people saying how hard medicine is going to be. Med school, residency, its all going to be such a b**tch but at the same time its exciting to think of what we all (hopefully) will accomplish someday. I'm actually kind of excited to be all worn down in the middle of the night, awake in a resident's bed all pissed off I'm not at home cause I decided to go into medicine.. I've felt that way about other things before, and they usually end up being the most rewarding. something about the challenge keeps me going so far, we'll see how long that lasts.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Next unread thread

Similar threads

D
Question about pre-med lifestyle
Replies
7
Views
877
Rachapkis
Rachapkis
T
Advice for a better lifestyle as a surgeon?
Replies
6
Views
1K
boshtrich
B
D
Questions about diff specialties and lifestyle of medicine
Replies
15
Views
2K
RangerBob
RangerBob
456432
What's a good resource to understand the lifestyle of physicians in each specialty?
Replies
9
Views
2K
JAK2-STAT3
J
S
MD vs PA
Replies
14
Views
2K
Meerkatology
Meerkatology
Top