So with the emergency medicine becoming very popular I wanted to know if internist or hospitalist (or subspecialized doctors) still are able to moonlight in emergency rooms? Is this mostly possible only in rural ERs?
moonlighting in er
- Thread starter jiffywerk
- Start date
- Joined
- Dec 14, 2006
- Messages
- 69,368
- Reaction score
- 61,721
You can still find places that will pay you to moonlight in the ED sure. Of course, most EDs would prefer an ER trained doc, but they'll take an internist, especially in rural EDs. The one thing too many people forget about when considering doing this is that you will be expected to see kids, sometimes very sick kids. So you better know what you're doing with a sick kid before you say you'll cover an ED or have the assurance from the hospital that the local peds/family guy will come see any sick kids.
- Joined
- Mar 17, 2011
- Messages
- 385
- Reaction score
- 111
Agree with this. If you are not comfortable with children you had better stay out because you do not want to be single coverage or be busy even with double coverage and not know how to manage children in a rural ED. I'd argue that you should either consider urgent care or apply to a VA ED to avoid getting yourself in trouble. Consider some hospitalist shifts as well since rural hospitals often pay as well to do this and its squarely within your scope of practice.
Thanks for the advice, I guess my concern was the difference in salary between er docs and hospitalists. it seems that both doctors can have similar work schedules (shift work), but er docs are better compensated for their time (on average). Just wanted to see what were the best ways that medicine docs can supplement their salaries with
- Joined
- May 29, 2003
- Messages
- 190
- Reaction score
- 2
I'm a cardiology fellow and moonlight in the ER at one of the local hospitals, so its definitely possible. Remember until fairly recently there was no "Emergency Medicine" and most ERs were staffed by internists. In addition to peds, you need to be prepared to deal with OB / Gyn to some extent and trauma. If you develop and keep this these skills active its fine, but most IM programs don't have enough ER exposure to become truly comfortable with stabilizing trauma IMO. The ER I work at does not do trauma as these all go to the main university hospital around the corner.
- Joined
- Nov 24, 2002
- Messages
- 24,263
- Reaction score
- 16,444
Don't give people too much false hope. "Until recently" is debatable - EM was recognized by ABMS in 1979. The practice track to board certification closed in 1989 (where, if you had enough time in the ED, you could sit for board certification). For more than 20 years now, the only way to be board eligible for EM is to do residency. The grandfathered in folks are retiring out in droves.
As for IM staffing EDs, I don't have solid numbers, but I don't believe that IM was the majority, or even a plurality before there was any significant EM trained presence.
If you are moonlighting, you are filling in holes. Even for groups that would hire IM for full time, if they had a qualified EM person, the EM person would get the job every single time, if every single other factor was equal.
