What is Emergency Medicine?

[Sunz81]

I know this question sounds incredibly juvenile, but what is emergency medicine? What does being an emergency physician entail?

I'm a foreign grad and now that I'm coming back to the states I've started to think more seriously about what I want to do. Unfortunately I was never really exposed to emergency medicine in school, but it does sound like an interesting field that I'd like to look into.

What I want to know is -

1. What is emergency medicine?

2. What does being an emergency physician mean?

3. What is residency like?

4. What fellowships are available to emergency physicians?

5. What are my options post-residency?

6. What's the lifestyle like?

7. What kind of salary would I make if I worked moderate hours?

8. Does this field require working for long stretches at a time, especially at night?

9. What kind of scores do I need?

10. How competitve is EM? Is it within the reach of foreign grads?

I'm so sorry I'm asking so many questions, but I figure this is probably the best place to get the answers. If any of you can even point me in the right direction to some other place I can get my answers, that would be great too. Once again, thanks and good luck in the match.

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[GeneralVeers]

1. What is emergency medicine? Acute care (trauma, really sick peopl) but it's becoming more and more like primary non-acute care every day (thanks EMTALA).

2. What does being an emergency physician mean? It means you are licensed to work in an emergency department

3. What is residency like? Better hours than most other residencies, but when you're in hospital expect to work 10X harder than other other residencies.

4. What fellowships are available to emergency physicians? Toxicology, EMS, Sports Medicine, a few others.

5. What are my options post-residency? Emergency department or urgent care clinic.

6. What's the lifestyle like? Golf 3-4 times per week with plenty to spend on strippersl.

7. What kind of salary would I make if I worked moderate hours? As with everything it depends how many hours you work and in what part of the country. Generally the range would be 200K to 400K.

8. Does this field require working for long stretches at a time, especially at night? Yes. If you don't want to do nightshifts look elsewhere.


9. What kind of scores do I need? 220 Step 1 for Americans, foreign grads probably need higher.

10. How competitve is EM? Is it within the reach of foreign grads? Very competetitive. Foreign grads are at a disadvantage, so they'd better shine.

 

[Sheerstress]

http://www.aamc.org/students/cim/pub_emergencymed.htm

http://www.dghems.org/dgwhat.html

 

[stoic]

i've always found DocB's description amusing and way too accurate:

Emergency medicine, saving the world from seeing their primary care provider

 

[Sunz81]

Thanks for the "Intro to EM" guys. I love how there's so much diversity but I'm a little bit worried about the lifestyle. I mean residency is residency, and I expect to be working my a** off and that too, at all odd hours, but once I'm done I kinda wanna have more fixed hours. Is that possible in EM? Are there any moms out there who are EP's and can tell me if it effects their family life in any way?