The reason the average $$$ of derm is high.
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Specialty War!!!!!
Started by molarseeker
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The reason the average $$$ of derm is high.
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EM. I like the short residency and shift work. I'm a bit ADD (like a bit of every specialty) and don't want to live my 20s and 30s in the hospital. Good pay, ability to work in urgent care centers or community hospitals that aren't trauma centers when I get older. No call.
This is a very logical and reasonable decision. Seriously, good for you. I applaud your choice and wish you the very best.
What made me steer away from EM (well, not that I was heading towards it anyway necessarily) was the fact that I sometimes found myself more tired on a 32-36 hour week doing EM swing shifts than I was doing 60-80 hour weeks on medicine. The constantly changing sleeping patterns (and make no mistake, as a young attending you have a good chance of being stuck with the odd shifts no one wants, which does not mean working overnight several nights a week.....it means filling in whatever shifts need to be filled, which could be a night shift, followed by two afternoon/evening shifts, then a day shift (not in 4 successive days, but you can figure it out). This can not only tire you out by disrupting your sleep cycle, but it kinda takes away (for me) the comfortable feeling of knowing that every day when 4:30 or 5pm rolls around, I'm outta work and the rest of the evening/night is mine (unless it's Friday, in which case I know the rest of the evening/night and the entire weekend is mine.
Even doing ED work in my TY has been annoying in that regard. When I did ED last month I would work 3 or 4 10's a week which isn't bad itself, but it was swing shift and I always felt tired and had no consistent schedule to get used to.
Of course, I am sure there are other people out there who adapt better to this - I would guess that they are the younger ones. I just caution against assuming you'll love this kind of sleep pattern (or lackthereof) the rest of your life.
Sorry if I come off sounding heavily anti-emergency medicine. I do think it's cool and I'm glad a lot of people really do seem to enjoy it. I just see it as invariably the one specialty that gets the most hype among premeds, and I often hear the "30 hours/week for $300k!" argument which sounds wonderful but is not exactly as advertised.
Stupid question:
When you say "CT Surgery," are you referring to Cardio-thoracic Surgery?
And if so, why is it called a dying art? Do surgeons no long go "into the box?" I don't see how that can be possible.
When you say "CT Surgery," are you referring to Cardio-thoracic Surgery?
And if so, why is it called a dying art? Do surgeons no long go "into the box?" I don't see how that can be possible.
Not completely sure, but my guess is that CT (yes, cardiothoracic) surgery is being slowly overtaken by interventional cardiology and vascular surgery? I could easily be wrong. There will always be the need for open-heart surgeries, but there is more of a shift now towards less-invasive procedures if at all possible. Plus a lot of (all?) bypass work is handled by vascular surgeons. There are a number of surgery residents that post here, maybe they can help us out.
Could anyone else comment on this? It's the first time I'm learning about the decline of CT surgeons, which is something I wanted to learn more about.
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Interventional cardio is taking the patients that in the past would've been CT patients.
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I think you are too focused on salary and lifestyle. You asked what the average salary of an orthodontist was and were fixated on that. Then you got the impression that orthodontics isn't the honey pot that you thought it was, so you got fixated on Oral Surgery. Then you realized Oral Surgery wasn't for you (I dont know reason why). Then you left dentistry all together for medicine. You were originally premed before predental. I actually agree with your choice of going over to medicine though. If you are worried sooo much about a financial saftey net, MD is probably the best route. Dentistry is pretty much go big or go home.
You are obsessed with numbers and averages and lifestyle. All of the professions are going to suck. Pretty much all specialists will make around $250-350k in the near future. A so-called well paying specialty now (such as Derm, Anesthisology and Plastic Surgery) may not be so well paying in the future because of Obamacare, the government's oppressive policies toward private practice doctors, and because cosmetics and other stuff are getting increasingly over-saturated. You probably wont make over $350k as a doctor and the sooner you deal with that harsh reality, the less questions you will ask and the happier you will find yourself.
But if you are just bent upon the fact that you think you can get rich off a med career, I recommend you keep your debt low and just focus on school to get into the best med school possible. If you accept the reality that being and MD wont make you rich, then I recommend you keep your debt low, pick the cheapest school possible, pick a specialty that interests you and use the financial capital you earn to START A BUSINESS.
The. End.
I ate some popcorn during that. Very nice rant if you don't mind me saying so.
CT surgeons used to be the metaphorical kings of the castle. They banked. Interventional cardiology has taken over a lot of their cases, rather quickly. There are certain things that will (probably) always need to be done open in the thorax, but they are (like all open surgeries) decreasing.
I'm surprised no one called me out on this, lol.
Where are the perfectionist Nazi's of SDN that I have grown to love and respect? 🙄
