Which specialties have the least amount of clinic?

[Ugen]

Now that I'm a little more than halfway through MSIII, I have come to realize the type of practice I dislike. Notably that I severely dislike clinic. My top interest right now is radiology but I was wondering what other specialties have low amounts of clinic time. I wouldn't be willing to do anything with more than a total of one day of clinic.

This is as far as I've gotten from the rotations I've done. I have no idea where to put OB/Psych/Heme-Onc/GI/Neurosurg/Urology etc.

No Clinic:
Radiology
Pathology
Anesthesiology?
Emergency Medicine

Mild Clinic 1-2d/wk
Trauma Surgery

Moderate Clinic 2-4d/wk
General Surgery
All Other Surgery Fields
Hospitalist
Interventional Cardiology
Neurology

All Clinic 4+d/wk
Dermatology
IM
Peds

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[kavorca]

I also hated clinic as a student. My med school would just kind of throw you into clinic, and it always was frenetic and disorganized. From talking to others and finally seeing some well run clinics, outpatient medicine is not nearly as craptastic as I experienced. I wouldn't let your student experience of clinic totally negate any specialty with clinic unless you have seen some of the nicer, well run clinics.

neurosurgery and urology (uro maybe even more) probably have at least 1 day of clinic a week, probably 1.5-2 days a week. Heme-Onc would probably be almost all clinic unless you were running a wards team. GI and OBGYN are probably moderate Clinic (on the heavy side) as you described. Psychiatry probably depends on how much inpatient stuff you do. I am not very familiar with the daily life of PP psychiatry. Radiology will have some clinic on IR rotations.

 

[mvenus929]

Honestly, it depends on your specific job. There are hospitalists in IM and Peds that have very little clinic (our IM hospitalists have roughly 1/2 day of clinic per week to do pre-op evaluations), any ICU position won't have much, if any clinic. Our trauma surgeons rotate through, and do general surgery and urgent surgery, so have at least one day per week of clinic.

What, specifically, is it about clinic that you despise so much?

 

[JJMrK]

Now that I'm a little more than halfway through MSIII, I have come to realize the type of practice I dislike. Notably that I severely dislike clinic. My top interest right now is radiology but I was wondering what other specialties have low amounts of clinic time. I wouldn't be willing to do anything with more than a total of one day of clinic.

This is as far as I've gotten from the rotations I've done. I have no idea where to put OB/Psych/Heme-Onc/GI/Neurosurg/Urology etc.

No Clinic:
Radiology
Pathology
Anesthesiology?
Emergency Medicine

Mild Clinic 1-2d/wk
Trauma Surgery
Moderate Clinic 2-4d/wk
General Surgery
All Other Surgery Fields
Hospitalist
Interventional Cardiology
Neurology
All Clinic 4+d/wk
Dermatology
IM
Peds

Depends heavily on one's individual practice. Also worth pointing out that some of the specialties you've listed will have clinics that are fairly procedure heavy.

A few modifications to the "No clinic" category:
Rads- Some IR services are holding clinics
Path- While rare, I've also seen things like FNA/cytopath clinic
Anesthesia- Some of these guys are doing things like pre-op clinic
EM- Endless clinic?

The rest totally depends on the practice you choose to craft. You'll find surgical subspecialties where some guys are doing 1 day of clinic and some are doing 3-4. In those fields you need patients to operate on, so the amount of clinic required depends heavily on the percentage of operative patients seen per clinic day. In my experience, the more senior attendings can typically get away with fewer clinic days, as they are able to choose to see patients that are likely to result in surgical cases. The junior guys often get left with the referrals that are less likely to need operative management, or the disasters that potentially shouldn't be operated on anyway.

As far as IM and peds go, it totally depends on whether you choose to do a fellowship. You've added some very specific subspecialties to this list (interventional cardiology, trauma surgery), but in other places left it almost too basic. A neonatologist is typically going to have fewer clinic days than a general pediatrician, for example.

 

[Kaputt]

Interventional radiology is moving towards having more clinic time (probably mild-moderate). So keep that in mind.

Diagnostic, obviously, has none.

 

[DrBowtie]

Interventional radiology is moving towards having more clinic time (probably mild-moderate). So keep that in mind.

Diagnostic, obviously, has none.

Most of the IR clinic work is done by PA/NP in my neck of the woods.
More money is made in the angio suite.

 

[Kaputt]

Most of the IR clinic work is done by PA/NP in my neck of the woods.
More money is made in the angio suite.

Interesting. From what I can tell, IR varies heavily from institution to institution. Some places on the interview trail were bragging about how their IR folks were "progressive" and making themselves more of an admitting specialty with real clinics and patients and whatnot. I didn't pay that much attention though cause I'm not really interested in IR.

 

[oldbearprofessor]

A neonatologist is typically going to have fewer clinic days than a general pediatrician, for example.

I haven't set foot in a clinic as a provider in over 25 years....There are a few neos who do weekly developmental or other f/u clinics, but that's rapidly disappearing and is really uncommon amongst those < 60 years old or so....

 

[JJMrK]

I haven't set foot in a clinic as a provider in over 25 years....There are a few neos who do weekly developmental or other f/u clinics, but that's rapidly disappearing and is really uncommon amongst those < 60 years old or so....

Thought you might comment on this.

 

[Psai]

Interesting. From what I can tell, IR varies heavily from institution to institution. Some places on the interview trail were bragging about how their IR folks were "progressive" and making themselves more of an admitting specialty with real clinics and patients and whatnot. I didn't pay that much attention though cause I'm not really interested in IR.

They should. The lack of admitting privileges is why they keep losing procedures to other specialties like vascular and cardiology.