I am second year ortho resident in my mid-30s. Someone PM'd me about another thread, and I realized my response be helpful or interesting to others, so I pasted it here with a few edits:
I was a physiology major and did decent on the MCAT, a 28, which I don't know how it correlates with the new scoring system.
I am married with two small kids. As I have mentioned in previous threads, if you go to a med school that does not require attendance at all lectures, lifestyle can be pretty decent in med school. It comes in waves though, and sometimes things are really stressful and hard, other times are pretty easy.
Residency is significantly harder than med school to find life balance. Some weeks can get sorta hard when I'm on call all weekend and then have a bunch of late nights in a row and I don't get to see the fam for days. It's been harder on my family, especially my wife than I anticipated. However, overall it's been okay, we're all doing well and adjusting. These rough weeks are offset by other weeks that aren't so bad. Also, some of the off- service months as an intern can be pretty damn chill depending on the rotation. Also, it's better as a second year when we take one in four weekends of call instead of every other weekend as an intern, and we're on backup. Now I just come in for the fun stuff: surgeries and teaching the intern how to do procedures in the ED. Being an intern was rough because we were on primary call, which requires a much bigger time commitment to deal with everything in the ED and on the floor and then document all that stuff. On top of the rough lifestyle, it is a very high stress job and you realize quickly how easily you can really hurt or even kill someone with any mistakes or misses. You have a lot of responsibility and people have very high expectations of you. Also, the nature of graduate medical education lends itself to being criticized and having your weaknesses exposed in front of your peers, so you have to have some thick skin.
I get enough time with family for the most part, but don't get a lot of time to partake in my personal hobbies. It's okay though because I know as time goes by I'll get more time for that stuff again. The lifestyle gets better each year in residency, and attending life is awesome.
A typical month on ortho: on call one or two weekends per month, which sometimes is chill where I get to be home in the afternoon after rounds and cases. Most of the time it's brutal and I'm pretty much at the hospital all weekend. A typical weekday: 5 am - 6 pm average. Rarely will be done by 3 or 4. Not uncommon to be done at 7-9 pm. On weeknight call 1-2 nights/week. Again, variable, some nights no calls and get to sleep, others you're up all night. You're also expected to read a lot and be prepared for cases, so you have to find time for that too.
Ortho residency is extremely difficult and can be super stressful at times, much harder than anything I experienced in med school or in life prior to med school. It's actually the hardest thing I've ever had to do. It's very physically, intellectually, and emotionally demanding. It would really suck if it weren't so fun! It's cool because we do some amazing things on a daily basis and really get to help people in meaningful ways. At my program we get a lot of hands on experience starting day one, and it feels amazing to actually be doing entire surgeries as an intern and second year. Bedside procedures in the ER are cool too, fracture reductions, extensor tendon repairs,etc. It's all super gratifying and fun.
While I have moments where I wonder why I've chosen such a difficult path, I'm happy I chose this path and would do it again if I had the option. I'm very satisfied with my specialty choice and love orthopedics, it's by far the best specialty. Many good outcomes, many patients are happy with their treatment, it's fun, it's physical, it's interesting, you have minimal documentation and overall bull**** to deal with compared to other specialties, and it pays really well. I am very happy I chose medical school and even if I got into any number of other specialties, I still would prefer that over other careers. Now I work with a lot of PTs, RNs, and PAs in the hospital and it makes me realize even more how happy I am that I chose medicine over these careers.
As for general advice for succeeding in getting into med school and then residency, aside from the standard advice (grades, MCAT, board scores, research, volunteering, etc) just work hard, study a lot, be down to earth, make connections with people who can help you by writing letters or whatever, try not to stress out too much, find time for family and fun, be nice to people, ask for help when you need it, and hope for good luck.
If anyone wants to see my thoughts on med school with kids, you can look at some of my past posts where I talk quite a bit about it.
I'm happy to answer more questions, however sometimes I'm short on time so it may take awhile to reply. Good luck!
I was a physiology major and did decent on the MCAT, a 28, which I don't know how it correlates with the new scoring system.
I am married with two small kids. As I have mentioned in previous threads, if you go to a med school that does not require attendance at all lectures, lifestyle can be pretty decent in med school. It comes in waves though, and sometimes things are really stressful and hard, other times are pretty easy.
Residency is significantly harder than med school to find life balance. Some weeks can get sorta hard when I'm on call all weekend and then have a bunch of late nights in a row and I don't get to see the fam for days. It's been harder on my family, especially my wife than I anticipated. However, overall it's been okay, we're all doing well and adjusting. These rough weeks are offset by other weeks that aren't so bad. Also, some of the off- service months as an intern can be pretty damn chill depending on the rotation. Also, it's better as a second year when we take one in four weekends of call instead of every other weekend as an intern, and we're on backup. Now I just come in for the fun stuff: surgeries and teaching the intern how to do procedures in the ED. Being an intern was rough because we were on primary call, which requires a much bigger time commitment to deal with everything in the ED and on the floor and then document all that stuff. On top of the rough lifestyle, it is a very high stress job and you realize quickly how easily you can really hurt or even kill someone with any mistakes or misses. You have a lot of responsibility and people have very high expectations of you. Also, the nature of graduate medical education lends itself to being criticized and having your weaknesses exposed in front of your peers, so you have to have some thick skin.
I get enough time with family for the most part, but don't get a lot of time to partake in my personal hobbies. It's okay though because I know as time goes by I'll get more time for that stuff again. The lifestyle gets better each year in residency, and attending life is awesome.
A typical month on ortho: on call one or two weekends per month, which sometimes is chill where I get to be home in the afternoon after rounds and cases. Most of the time it's brutal and I'm pretty much at the hospital all weekend. A typical weekday: 5 am - 6 pm average. Rarely will be done by 3 or 4. Not uncommon to be done at 7-9 pm. On weeknight call 1-2 nights/week. Again, variable, some nights no calls and get to sleep, others you're up all night. You're also expected to read a lot and be prepared for cases, so you have to find time for that too.
Ortho residency is extremely difficult and can be super stressful at times, much harder than anything I experienced in med school or in life prior to med school. It's actually the hardest thing I've ever had to do. It's very physically, intellectually, and emotionally demanding. It would really suck if it weren't so fun! It's cool because we do some amazing things on a daily basis and really get to help people in meaningful ways. At my program we get a lot of hands on experience starting day one, and it feels amazing to actually be doing entire surgeries as an intern and second year. Bedside procedures in the ER are cool too, fracture reductions, extensor tendon repairs,etc. It's all super gratifying and fun.
While I have moments where I wonder why I've chosen such a difficult path, I'm happy I chose this path and would do it again if I had the option. I'm very satisfied with my specialty choice and love orthopedics, it's by far the best specialty. Many good outcomes, many patients are happy with their treatment, it's fun, it's physical, it's interesting, you have minimal documentation and overall bull**** to deal with compared to other specialties, and it pays really well. I am very happy I chose medical school and even if I got into any number of other specialties, I still would prefer that over other careers. Now I work with a lot of PTs, RNs, and PAs in the hospital and it makes me realize even more how happy I am that I chose medicine over these careers.
As for general advice for succeeding in getting into med school and then residency, aside from the standard advice (grades, MCAT, board scores, research, volunteering, etc) just work hard, study a lot, be down to earth, make connections with people who can help you by writing letters or whatever, try not to stress out too much, find time for family and fun, be nice to people, ask for help when you need it, and hope for good luck.
If anyone wants to see my thoughts on med school with kids, you can look at some of my past posts where I talk quite a bit about it.
I'm happy to answer more questions, however sometimes I'm short on time so it may take awhile to reply. Good luck!
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