Most flexible specialty

[makesomerheum]

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I am looking for a specialty that allows me to take off a couple of months/yr for international medicine, gives me a broad-base of medicine or surgery to be the most useful in the international setting, and accomodates good patient relationships. Any thoughts or does this specialty not exist.

 

[lvspro]

family medicine with a fellowship in line with ob/gyn... not sure what it's called. the flexible part comes in to play by finding a large group, being their slave until you make partner, and then you can do scheduling tradeoffs with the partners.

 

[Roadrunner]

FP or general surgery sound like the best match for your international interests. In terms of lifestyle, you're just going to have to find the right practice setting. I know several FPs who take 3-6weeks each year to do volunteer work in Haiti, East Africa, etc. I know one pediatric surgeon at my home institution that takes 2-3months each year to do work in West Africa. You just have to find the right situation and be willing to make less money overall.

 

[wtwei02]

Tons of opportunities for international work...cataracts are still the number one cause of preventable blindness worldwide. For the most part, very flexible hours. Awesome patient relationships for the most part, your patients usually are very happy when you can help them see. Lots of applicable medicine and surgery, plus lots of direction within the specialty...you can do lots of surgery (oculoplastics, retina) or almost no surgery (neuro-ophth, medical retina). Take lots of call or very little call. And work with kids if you do pediatric ophtho. But then again, i'm a bit biased.

 

[DOCTORSAIB]

Tons of opportunities for international work...cataracts are still the number one cause of preventable blindness worldwide. For the most part, very flexible hours. Awesome patient relationships for the most part, your patients usually are very happy when you can help them see. Lots of applicable medicine and surgery, plus lots of direction within the specialty...you can do lots of surgery (oculoplastics, retina) or almost no surgery (neuro-ophth, medical retina). Take lots of call or very little call. And work with kids if you do pediatric ophtho. But then again, i'm a bit biased.

I couldn't have said it better. When it comes to international experience, very few fields allow you to make an impact like ophthalmology. Cataract surgery is a relatively simple surgery to perform, yet the end result (usually) is, usually, very gratifying.

I did a 4-week eye surgical mission in south India this past summer. The huge backlog of cataracts that existed around 10 years ago is slowly disappearing, thanks to galant efforts of the eye clinics/hospitals in the region. Arasan Eye hospital, located in a town called Erode, has been doing large-scale cataract camps for over 8 years. In our six days in Erode, we brought back over a 1000 patients for further evaluation and managed to perform 228 cataract surgeries!

Suffice it to say that there were ALOT of happy people who would have otherwise continued to live their lives in complete darkness. Moral of the story: ophthalmology is an amazing field, especially if you're interested in international experience. G'luck.

 

[makesomerheum]

Gen Surg: do you get to know your patients?
Ophtho: a definite considreation, but will it give me the skills I need to run a clinic that serves the medical needs of a village?
FP w/ OBGyn: sounds like a possibility. I have considered Med/Peds since it covers everything. How does this compare with FP?

I really appreciate the feedback so far.

 

[lvspro]

Gen Surg: do you get to know your patients?
Ophtho: a definite considreation, but will it give me the skills I need to run a clinic that serves the medical needs of a village?
FP w/ OBGyn: sounds like a possibility. I have considered Med/Peds since it covers everything. How does this compare with FP?

I really appreciate the feedback so far.

Medpeds: Much more depth in your knowledge base for oldies, and youngies, although you probably wont be as nimble in Female medical mgmt. Also, med-people tend to be a little sqeamish with procedures. The glaring hole most people don't consider in med peds when they say it "covers everything" is the lack of female medicine. I'm sure you remember being an MS3, and hearing the OB/GYN-ies ripping on internists, much more than FM, that try to mng females.
FM: Much more congruent with where you're headed b/c most other countries aren't too quick to the trigger for labs/imaging and the other expensive modalities that IM/ped docs employ. Most FP's I know are very cost-concientious, much more so than any other specialty. In fact, I remember on my FP rotation the weekly updates in cost containment for clinic. Furthermore, IM/peds docs here treat a lot of rich-people dz ie htn, cad, CA drugs, oh, etc... Since most 3rd world countries have problems with infection, malnutrition, vaccination and things of that sort , and you don't really need to know the very last molecule involved to treat these diseases, you might not need the depth of a med-peds residency. Furthermore, FM-ob/gyn spend way more time in the OR, and hence, the OR experience may come in handy in a "Oh $hit, this guys got a popped appy, and there's no surgeons around... can you do anything" type of experience. Maybe you can't do anything, but hey, at least you know the anatomy, and could try.

Either way, I think what you're doing is noble. I hope you find you're niche.

Disclaimer, the above is only my opinion.

 

[Snoopy]

EM can be very flexible. You can front load your schedule to have a lot of time off during a month. You can only work certain times of the year depending on your group and where you practice. You can do locums. You know a lot of medicine and are able to do some simple procedures. There is a rapidly growing international EM community and there are many international EM fellowships.

 

[MD Dreams]

I would agree that Ophthalmology is good, but you'll be limited to helping people out only with their eye pathologies.

In my opinion, the two best specialties for international work are general surgery and anesthesiology. The first will allow you to do A LOT in the field for you will know both the medical and surgical management of many common ailments. The second will give you more flexibility in your schedule and you can't do the first without the second. If you look at the doctors without borders web site you'll see that they are always looking for general surgeons and anesthesiologists. Of course they are also looking for other types of doctors, but I think these two can be of most benefit. Good luck.

 

[cytoskelement]

with optho - you can do whatever internship you want! do a TY and load you're electives up with outpatient clinics, surgery, IM, etc. even a medical internship allows you some electives. then during your pgy2+ years, you can always volunteer on saturdays in a free clinic in the mornings to develop your phys. exam, diagnosing, and even "bo staff" skills. or to help fund your oversea experiences, you can moonlight (gain $ and experience).