What is the best specialty for part-time work?

[RN1]

Once you are an attending, is it possible to work 3 consecutive months per year and make $80 000 after tax?
How much should one expect to earn if only working 3 months per year?
What specialties are best for this type of work? I know that EM, hospitalist and anesthesia can work shifts and this makes it easier, but can't all specialties do this if they decide to do locum work?
Does anyone have any experience with this?

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[PMPMD]

Once you are an attending, is it possible to work 3 consecutive months per year and make $80 000 after tax?
How much should one expect to earn if only working 3 months per year?
What specialties are best for this type of work? I know that EM, hospitalist and anesthesia can work shifts and this makes it easier, but can't all specialties do this if they decide to do locum work?
Does anyone have any experience with this?

Most fields (non-hospital-based) require a referral base. You can't just set up shop for 3 months and then jet. You could take over a practice for a retiring or otherwise no longer practicing doc, but I doubt you could get a 3 month contract.

Locums would be feasible with the fields you mention (hospital-based). I believe rads also fits in this category. 80k after taxes in 3 months would be on the high end (well over 400/year).

 

[Oxer45]

Once you are an attending, is it possible to work 3 consecutive months per year and make $80 000 after tax?
How much should one expect to earn if only working 3 months per year?
What specialties are best for this type of work? I know that EM, hospitalist and anesthesia can work shifts and this makes it easier, but can't all specialties do this if they decide to do locum work?
Does anyone have any experience with this?

Why? Are you planning on being a teacher full time and being a doctor on the 3 summer months teachers have off? Can anyone even be a good doctor not working 9 months straight? You'll forget a lot. Think about how much you forgot right after you took usmle.

 

[dragonfly99]

You could do locums but doubt you'd make 80k for working 3 months a year. For locums, hospitalist, ER, anesthesia, or primary care seem fairly in demand. R remember, for Locums you generally have to move/fly or drive to wherever they want you to work, which is usually underserved areas like Maine, rural areas of the South and Midwest, etc. Also, usually when your medical license comes up for renewal each year you have to say if you have ceased to practice for more then 8-12 weeks at a time (or 3-4 months...depends on the state) and you would have to explain yourself, as to why you aren't working more. Also, if you do locums you generally have to provide/buy your own health insurance, disability and life insurance, etc. All those benefits that if you are employed full time or in a large group practice that you would be getting as part of your benefits package. I think it is highly, highly doubtful that you'd clear 80k in 3 months of work as a Locums...perhaps in radiology it might be possible.

 

[Dr. USMLE]

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[Law2Doc]

Once you are an attending, is it possible to work 3 consecutive months per year and make $80 000 after tax?
How much should one expect to earn if only working 3 months per year?
What specialties are best for this type of work? I know that EM, hospitalist and anesthesia can work shifts and this makes it easier, but can't all specialties do this if they decide to do locum work?
Does anyone have any experience with this?

No you can't be a doctor and take off 9 months out of every year. It's not likely you could maintain your skills and knowledge base with such long hiatus, no way to have a patient base, no employer that would be interested in you. It's not realistic,

 

[PMPMD]

Idk any rads who work 25% of the year but know many who work 25% of the week and earn >>$80k net

25% of week = 42 hours = nice

 

[peppy]

I agree it would be more likely to work out if you wanted a part time job of reduced hours on a weekly basis rather than only for a few months a year. I've seen a lot of job postings in psych for <40 hrs a week year round.

 

[Dr. USMLE]

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[flipmd]

I know many (mostly female - no judgement here) general internists who have clinic weekday mornings only. They clear about 100K/year. Then again most of them have husbands in high-earning specialties.

 

[RN1]

Thank you for your replies.

How much time can you take off without getting any problems when renewing your license?
Is it the consecutive time or total hours per year that matters?
What states have the longest time period that you can be inactive?
Is there a distinction between the state medical license and the board certification in your specialty when it comes to this matter?
I read that many states have a 1 year limit and after this you have to enter a re-entry program (like doing the SPEX). Does this mean that 3 consecutive working months per year is a possibility or will the license not be renewed the second year you do this (due to few clinical hours) causing you to enter “inactive status” even when you were practicing that year?

How does CME work in this case? Can you get all your CME credits in 3 months while practicing full time (for only 3 months)? Can you get all your credits online? The only way to be exempted of this is working in academics, is this true?

Does it make a difference if you are willing to work in underserved areas?

 

[Oxer45]

Not to make any judgments, but who goes through the hell called med school/residency to only work 3 mo a year? How will you pay off your student loans? Assuming you're an RN now, here's some numbers :

4 yr med school + 3 yr residency =7 yrs
80k as RN x 7 yrs = 560k
med school debt ~200k
-----------------------------------------
cost=debt 200k + opportunity cost 560k = 760k

So as a MD making 80k/yr it'll take you 9.5yr just to break even. So basically you will not make any net money for the next 15 yrs.

 

[Law2Doc]

Thank you for your replies.

How much time can you take off without getting any problems when renewing your license?
Is it the consecutive time or total hours per year that matters?
What states have the longest time period that you can be inactive?
Is there a distinction between the state medical license and the board certification in your specialty when it comes to this matter?
I read that many states have a 1 year limit and after this you have to enter a re-entry program (like doing the SPEX). Does this mean that 3 consecutive working months per year is a possibility or will the license not be renewed the second year you do this (due to few clinical hours) causing you to enter “inactive status” even when you were practicing that year?

How does CME work in this case? Can you get all your CME credits in 3 months while practicing full time (for only 3 months)? Can you get all your credits online? The only way to be exempted of this is working in academics, is this true?

Does it make a difference if you are willing to work in underserved areas?

It's not a licensure issue, it's a competency issue. Medical skills are very much a use it or lose it skillset. If you took 9 months off a year, you would forever be making the same stupid mistakes interns make, because you would always be starting green, but without an attending overseeing you. Honestly you could probably find a part time job of 35 hours a week with 4 weeks of vacation a year, with a relatively low salary and no career progression options, but trying to go beyond that would be unrealistic IMHO.

Also I am pretty sure you don't get exempted from CME for working in academics. The academicians still seem to go to meetings and courses to log their CME. Most fields only allow you to get a minority of CME credits online.

 

[oldbearprofessor]

If you took 9 months off a year, you would forever be making the same stupid mistakes interns make, because you would always be starting green, but without an attending overseeing you.

Except for night and weekend call, which are very different skills, I haven't done clinical work more than 2 months a year my entire career, now well over 2 decades post-training. NIH mandates 20-25% clinical time maximum for many types of grantees as well.

I'm pretty sure that when I go 6-8 months without doing rounds or even a couple months without doing a procedure, I haven't forgotten anything. Of course, I'm probably deluding myself and have slipped into incompetence through only working clinically 2 months/year.

 

[Law2Doc]

... Of course, I'm probably deluding myself and have slipped into incompetence through only working clinically 2 months/year.

yeah, actually you might be, although you intended to be sarcastic. It's the whole point behind CME, and re-certification exams. Unused skills simply don't remain skills, they wither and die. Whether you appreciate or not, you do, in fact, lose skills by going many months not using them. Someone with far less experience who uses the skills every single day is simply going to be better than you at some point, and that's not a good thing. It happens to everyone -- I certainly wouldn't be an effective lawyer at this point, having not used my skills in quite a while.

Not sure your comment really applies to the OP who only plans to go to work 3 months out of the year -- I'm assuming you do have a job which requires you to use medical knowledge throughout the year, and are carving out clinical stuff for purposes of this discussion. But I'd bet if you only worked three months out of the year every year, you neither would develop very good skills nor retain them.

 

[gutonc]

Once you are an attending, is it possible to work 3 consecutive months per year and make $80 000 after tax?
How much should one expect to earn if only working 3 months per year?
What specialties are best for this type of work? I know that EM, hospitalist and anesthesia can work shifts and this makes it easier, but can't all specialties do this if they decide to do locum work?
Does anyone have any experience with this?

The best specialty for PT work is nursing. You should have stuck with it.

 

[IlDestriero]

Anesthesia is a great field for part time work if that's your thing. Locums jobs usually pay $1250-1500/day for 8 hours. Many have overtime and call potential. Some jobs are a couple weeks, some a couple months. You will have to move around though.
If you took a 3 month job and only worked 60 8 hr days you would make a minimum of $75k, potentially much more. You also might be able to set up a recurring job if you're actually good. Many locums folks are very weak, lazy, or both.
I wouldn't want to do it, but everyone has their own idea of a dream job. Do what you want, don't listen to the smoke blowers.
Some academic groups will hire per diem, the problem there is the job is not guaranteed and might go away completely depending on the staffing needs. The people that I know that do academic anesthesia per diem work are very experienced though and they work part time because they don't have to work but want to keep their skills up.

 

[Roguelyn]

IM/FM to hospitalist or urgent care is an option. I have colleagues taking jobs working 2-3 nights/week for ~100K and more.