Residency tuition? Salary?

[SnowTown]

When doing residency, do we actually pay tuition or just get paid a salary?

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[DrMom]

you get paid a salary.

 

[SnowTown]

you get paid a salary.

and if the salary is not enough to cover living expenses one can qualify for residency student loan?

thanks,

 

[DrMom]

You can, but you should be able to survive on a resident salary in most parts of the country. Heck, I support my entire family & send my kid to a private school on it. I do live in a less expensive part of the country, but we live well. If we lived somewhere more expensive we'd cut back on unnecessary things and/or my hubby would work.

I certainly wouldn't want to keep adding to my debt load.

 

[Rugby MD]

from what I have seen most of the residency positions pay about 40 k, more in places like NYC, less places with a low cost of living. I figure its about 80k more than I am making right now, so it should suffice. also, I think you can get forbearance/deferment on your student loans so you don't have to start paying them back til you are done with residency.

 

[PEN15]

from what I have seen most of the residency positions pay about 40 k, more in places like NYC, less places with a low cost of living. I figure its about 80k more than I am making right now, so it should suffice. also, I think you can get forbearance/deferment on your student loans so you don't have to start paying them back til you are done with residency.

That's one way to look at it.

I don't think I've ever heard of anybody taking out additional loans during their residency. With 200K of debt, will banks even loan you the money? Although, I have heard of people buying a house during residency. Can't you just moonlight during residency if you're so worried about money?

 

[Wizard of Oz]

From what I have seen most of the residency positions pay about 40K...I figure its about 80k more than I am making right now...

lol so true...

With 200K of debt, will banks even loan you the money?

At least right now where I live, student loan debt for somebody with M.D. after his/her name is not a big deal. For one of my friends who is practicing in my state, the bank gave him a nice interest rate with nothing down based on his earning potential alone.

 

[8744]

When doing residency, do we actually pay tuition or just get paid a salary?

Well, they call it a salary but in reality it's more of an insult.

I'll admit I wasn't much use as an intern but surely now I am worth more than $7.13 and hour.

 

[StevenRF]

I'm kinda scared of how little I'll be making in residency. 40k isnt all that much if your living in a place like LA. Heck, my monthly rent for a bedroom in student housing is 990$, and thats very subsidized considering local rental prices are closer to 1500$ w/o utilities if you want to live anywhere close to where you work. 40k would be easy to live on if I just had my apt., car insurance, water, power, gas, cell phone, and food. But then you tack on 250k in loans at 8% interest minimum for federal loans and up to 15% for my privates. I've heard a rough estimate is for every 10k in loans you have to pay a 100$ a month, so I cant wait to drop 2500$ every month. I could do it on 60k, but no way on 40k.

I kinda wanted to do a surgical residency too, but just imagine defering student loans at those interest rates for almost a decade.... The interest would total my loans. Then do the same for a year or two for a fellowship. It's actually quite rediculous. What other profession makes less than minimum wage after 8 years of post secondary education? And then by the time your a PGY-7 your making like 55k after 15 years of school/training...

Here's what I say we should do. Organize a national campaign to have all residents accross all specialties have a giant walk out. Maybe the dems will be able to undo some of the crap thats been done to student aid like the interest rates...

 

[deleted77919]

Some people blame the match for low wages. Essentially you can't compare two offers, negotiate for salary, etc.

The problems is in the pre-match days, crazy things would happen, like med students would get calls at 3am saying if they wanted a spot in that program they could have one, but had to decide by 4am or the deal was off. This way less competitive residencies could lure students who were too scared of not getting another offer.

 

[deuist]

8% interest minimum for federal loans and up to 15% for my privates.

Are your rates really this high? I though that the federal rates were lower [1]. Further, if your private loans are 15%, you need to perform an in-school consolidation to lower the rate you're paying. The best option would be to sit with a financial aid counselor at your medical school to see where you can go from here.

[1] http://www.finaid.org/loans/scripts/interest.cgi

 

[psipsina]

When I started paying back my undergrad loans before I matricualted into medschool I was offered a plan where my payments were small to start with, and then got increasingly bigger over a 30 year period so the bulk of my debt would be paid when I was older . . . I did this knowing I was going to defer anyway and just wanting the smaller payments while I made 27K as a research tech, but I assumed that a similar situation would be set up while in residency, . . where you would make smaller payments while in residency and then the payments would get larger as you got further in your career and could afford more per month.

Also, does anyone know if the residency salary is stable thruout a residency, or do you get little raises along the way? I know it woudn't really be much in a 3-4 year residency, but what about the 7 year surgical subspecialties? And does anyone know what pay is like if you choose to do a fellowship, is it more than residency or the same?

 

[DoctorFunk]

Also, does anyone know if the residency salary is stable thruout a residency, or do you get little raises along the way? I know it woudn't really be much in a 3-4 year residency, but what about the 7 year surgical subspecialties? And does anyone know what pay is like if you choose to do a fellowship, is it more than residency or the same?

Most of the programs I've looked at increase pay depending on what year post-grad you are. So during second year of residency you might make 2K more than you did during intern year, then get bumped up another 2K or so during your third year out of school.

As far as fellowships, I've only really looked at cardiology but it looked like they started a little higher (approx. 50K/year) than residents get paid, and increased at about the same rate, 2 or 3K per year they are in the program.

 

[sirus_virus]

I'm kinda scared of how little I'll be making in residency. 40k isnt all that much if your living in a place like LA. Heck, my monthly rent for a bedroom in student housing is 990$, and thats very subsidized considering local rental prices are closer to 1500$ w/o utilities if you want to live anywhere close to where you work. 40k would be easy to live on if I just had my apt., car insurance, water, power, gas, cell phone, and food. But then you tack on 250k in loans at 8% interest minimum for federal loans and up to 15% for my privates. I've heard a rough estimate is for every 10k in loans you have to pay a 100$ a month, so I cant wait to drop 2500$ every month. I could do it on 60k, but no way on 40k.

I kinda wanted to do a surgical residency too, but just imagine defering student loans at those interest rates for almost a decade.... The interest would total my loans. Then do the same for a year or two for a fellowship. It's actually quite rediculous. What other profession makes less than minimum wage after 8 years of post secondary education? And then by the time your a PGY-7 your making like 55k after 15 years of school/training...

Here's what I say we should do. Organize a national campaign to have all residents accross all specialties have a giant walk out. Maybe the dems will be able to undo some of the crap thats been done to student aid like the interest rates...

My Uncle pays about that for a 1900 sq ft house with a swimming pool in the midwest.

 

[Miami_med]

I'm kinda scared of how little I'll be making in residency. 40k isnt all that much if your living in a place like LA. Heck, my monthly rent for a bedroom in student housing is 990$, and thats very subsidized considering local rental prices are closer to 1500$ w/o utilities if you want to live anywhere close to where you work. 40k would be easy to live on if I just had my apt., car insurance, water, power, gas, cell phone, and food. But then you tack on 250k in loans at 8% interest minimum for federal loans and up to 15% for my privates. I've heard a rough estimate is for every 10k in loans you have to pay a 100$ a month, so I cant wait to drop 2500$ every month. I could do it on 60k, but no way on 40k.

I kinda wanted to do a surgical residency too, but just imagine defering student loans at those interest rates for almost a decade.... The interest would total my loans. Then do the same for a year or two for a fellowship. It's actually quite rediculous. What other profession makes less than minimum wage after 8 years of post secondary education? And then by the time your a PGY-7 your making like 55k after 15 years of school/training...

Here's what I say we should do. Organize a national campaign to have all residents accross all specialties have a giant walk out. Maybe the dems will be able to undo some of the crap thats been done to student aid like the interest rates...

There are almost always ways to defer loans during residency. If you can't you can always get a hardship forebearance on all FEDERAL loans. Your privates don't have to grant this, but many will. In other words, you should be able to put off any payment on the majority of your loans during residency.

 

[zimmie256]

Most of the programs I've looked at increase pay depending on what year post-grad you are. So during second year of residency you might make 2K more than you did during intern year, then get bumped up another 2K or so during your third year out of school.

As far as fellowships, I've only really looked at cardiology but it looked like they started a little higher (approx. 50K/year) than residents get paid, and increased at about the same rate, 2 or 3K per year they are in the program.

I didn't realize fellowships paid almost as poorly as residencies... Yikes!

Are fellowships funded through Medicare (like residencies are)?

 

[deleted109597]

Alright, before everyone flips out.
Fellowships pay very little more than residency. Some you can earn $80K, some you can earn $50K.
Right now, the GME will cite programs if they feel that they are not paying residents enough. Most places pay around $42K, with $1500 or so raise per year. Thus, as mentioned earlier, PGY7s often earn well into the 50s. However, some start closer to $49K for PGY1. Not that this is a ton of money though.
If you look at any residency website, they will have a listing of what that particular sponsoring institution will pay. Funny thing is that it is usually across the board, thus a PGY1 makes the same regardless of surgery, EM, transitional year, etc. Just in case anyone was wondering.
Carry on.

 

[deuist]

Another important point for fellowship salary is to look at your roles and whether the program is accredited. Advocate Christ Medical Center offers an emergency medicine ultrasound fellowship that pays $125,000. According to the website, fellows will serve general clinical needs in the ED and will also teach EM residents. Looks that they're getting an attending in EM at half price.