Psych wanting to switch to Path

[Panama Red]

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I'm a psychiatry resident and distressed to admit that I STRONGLY dislike seeing psych patients. Mostly, I find myself emotionally drained after a shift. I've enjoy the theory of psych but I do not like the clinical management. I'm an introvert and a very concrete person (I liked facts, not theory to support diagnosis and treatment). I also like a quiet work space and ability to make definitive, precise diagnosis. Of note, I've also realized that I like more to diagnose medical conditions than necessarily treat them.
Psych is too much of a revolving door, too ambiguous, and I'm not feeling happy anymore with my choice. Ultimately, I respect psych but I'm realizing it is not for me.
I am now strongly considering specialties with more autonomy, more precision, diagnosis-focused specialties with little or no clinical patient management, like rads or path.
Nevertheless, one great fear I have are the demands of rads residency vs path. I am all about quality of life. I've seen some disturbing threads about radiology residents being extremely unhappy with the demands of residency. Also, I would like to know what skills are important to being successful in pathology and what to expect during residency and afterwards. All in all, I want to know that it would be a good fit for me.

 

[MirkoCrocop]

well, can you handle DeAd BOdIeS!?!?

 

[MrSunshine]

I switched out of internal medicine to pathology. So far it's been a great decision. Be prepared to study like crazy if you decide on path. The hours are great (8-12 hours a day, usually Monday through Friday, depending on the rotation), but the knowledge base required to be competent is vast. Doing the residency is essentially getting another degree...complete with all the studying. Still beats the heck out of medicine in my opinion.

 

[Panama Red]

Mr Sunshine, could you tell me some of the reasons you switched to Path.

 

[MrSunshine]

Here are my reasons:

1. Internists work like animals. The hours are long, the pay isn't great, and you go unappreciated (it seemed to me) by your patients.
2. The work:helping people ratio was ridiculous. I felt like most of my time was spent on stuff that really didn't help anyone (e.g. keeping demented people with multiple medical problems (which made them really difficult to manage) from dying, calming down angry families, etc.). You do actually help people, but it's just punctuated by tons of other garbage.
3. Pathologist serve a valuable role, are well compensated, and work between 40-50 hours a week. The residency isn't brutal, and you don't have to talk to patients and their families. You're actually treated like a human, both in residency and practice.
4. The job market for pathologists is pretty good in the midwest, which is where I'm from.

Hope that helps. Good luck on your decision. I have no regrets about path.

 

[Panama Red]

Mr. Sunshine, I find that I am looking for a specialty with high autonomy, good pay, and that is diagnosis-focused (i do not have interest in clinical managment or treatment of medical issues). would you say path is a good choice for me? Of particular note is the fact that I am doing a transitional year now and I don't think/know if any off my current rotations will count towards anything if I do switch to path. Someone I know recommended radiology since I would have completed a transitional year anyway. Did you ever consider this specialty since it and path a pretty similar? Also do you know if the work hours for the 2 specialties are similar? I am ALL about <40-50 hour work weeks, preferably 40 hours.

 

[Unty]

Mr. Sunshine, I find that I am looking for a specialty with high autonomy, good pay, and that is diagnosis-focused (i do not have interest in clinical managment or treatment of medical issues). would you say path is a good choice for me? Of particular note is the fact that I am doing a transitional year now and I don't think/know if any off my current rotations will count towards anything if I do switch to path. Someone I know recommended radiology since I would have completed a transitional year anyway. Did you ever consider this specialty since it and path a pretty similar? Also do you know if the work hours for the 2 specialties are similar? I am ALL about <40-50 hour work weeks, preferably 40 hours.

What do you consider "good pay?" Have you completed a rotation in either rads and path? I mean you can probably find a gig for 40-50 hours a week with good pay (150-200K) somewhere in both fields, with rads poss paying more. Really depends on which field you are more interested in. Many ppl think the two are similar but in practice the two are very different. You have to do a rotation in the two fields before proceeding.

In short, the two fields can offer what you are looking for in terms of good pay and hours, but you really have to pick a field based on interest.