Will medicine ever become boring ?

[CaptainJackSparrow83]

Ive shadowed lots of types of physicians, and it seems cool with all the variety but now that I realize as you chose a specialty it probably gets repetetive.
The gastric surgeon I shadowed was doing mainly hernia repairs and colon cancer excisions on a daily basis
Intervention cardiologist was pacemakers with a few other procedures but mainly pacemakers
Internal medicine was primarily dealing with checkups and physicals, in the hospital the standard stuff.

When you look at it as a whole theres so much going on but now that Im thinking is it going to be a repetitive boring daily process?

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[Anti-PD1]

One man's hernia is another man's subdural.

Everything becomes repetitive and boring. The human mind learns by recognizing patterns. We are reductive creatures. Open heart surgery can become meh if you do it enough.

The key is to find a specialty where these repetitive things are tolerable enough, and the zebras you do see justify this monotony. Or the $$$/hot wife do.

 

[Jojos]

this is something that i thought a lot about. which is why i am battling doing neuro which i love and doing another specialty that is more varied since i know i get bored quickly and need variety.

 

[Mad Jack]

I actually struggled between psych and FM for this very reason. As much as people knock outpatient FM, the field as a whole actually offers a lot of opportunities for doing different things without fellowships. Urgent care, ER, hospitalist, outpatient, etc. I feel like fellowships just push you into a small box that'd, for me at least, get incredibly boring. Psych ultimately has enough variety to keep me busy for quite some time, and the fellowships to broaden my practice to a new area are short enough that I can make the jump to different areas of practice more quickly than a field like IM or surgery.

 

[Mad Jack]

this is something that i thought a lot about. which is why i am battling doing neuro which i love and doing another specialty that is more varied since i know i get bored quickly and need variety.

Neuro is a field with a lot of fellowships that can substantially change your practice that are only a year or two in length. It's a great field if you like variety, and it's constantly changing as we come to a better understanding of neurology.

 

[austintr]

One man's hernia is another man's subdural.

Everything becomes repetitive and boring. The human mind learns by recognizing patterns. We are reductive creatures. Open heart surgery can become meh if you do it enough.

The key is to find a specialty where these repetitive things are tolerable enough, and the zebras you do see justify this monotony. Or the $$$/hot wife do.

This. It will become boring. At least a lot of it will. The key is figuring out what kind of boring you'd rather have. Even the high stress/high stakes specialties where seconds matter will get very tedious.

Most of your life will (should) take place outside of what you do for a living, even in medicine.

 

[Jojos]

Neuro is a field with a lot of fellowships that can substantially change your practice that are only a year or two in length. It's a great field if you like variety, and it's constantly changing as we come to a better understanding of neurology.

that's good to know.

 

[Postictal Raiden]

this is something that i thought a lot about. which is why i am battling doing neuro which i love and doing another specialty that is more varied since i know i get bored quickly and need variety.

Neurology is an ocean. When I rotated in outpatient neurology, on a given day, I saw Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, seizures, MS, cerebral palsy, headaches, low back pain, fibromyeligia, carpal tunnel, strokes, and a good number of zebras (bells palsy due to a mass in the base of skull, ramsey hunt, Ade's, Soto's, Bechet's, early onset alzheimer's, chiari malformation, etc..).

However, like everyone else said, it all becomes mundane after doing it for a while. I chose neurology because I find the CNS the most interesting organ system.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

Most everything gets boring when you do it a ton of times.

 

[ortnakas]

Most everything gets boring when you do it a ton of times.

This. Even if you love it.

What I've been told by attendings to do is 1) look for something interesting/unique in every patient, there will always be something and 2) pick the specialty where you enjoy the bits others consider boring, at least a little.

 

[BorntobeDO?]

OP, I take it you are doing better than your previous thread?

Ive shadowed lots of types of physicians, and it seems cool with all the variety but now that I realize as you chose a specialty it probably gets repetetive.
The gastric surgeon I shadowed was doing mainly hernia repairs and colon cancer excisions on a daily basis
Intervention cardiologist was pacemakers with a few other procedures but mainly pacemakers
Internal medicine was primarily dealing with checkups and physicals, in the hospital the standard stuff.

When you look at it as a whole theres so much going on but now that Im thinking is it going to be a repetitive boring daily process?

 

[deleted103644]

Neuro is a field with a lot of fellowships that can substantially change your practice that are only a year or two in length. It's a great field if you like variety, and it's constantly changing as we come to a better understanding of neurology.

Many cool diagnoses, basically nothing to do about them except prescribe various doses of aspirin and/or steroids.

 

[Mad Jack]

Many cool diagnoses, basically nothing to do about them except prescribe various doses of aspirin and/or steroids.

Common misconception, from what the neurologists on here say.

 

[allantois]

The variety comes from interacting with different types of patients, not from their disease processes.

 

[CaptainJackSparrow83]

OP, I take it you are doing better than your previous thread?

Hey thanks for checking in on me. I am doing better, since all my classes except for anatomy were fine, we are into the better part of anatomy now also (the arm and back).
I still am not 100% sure if I want to continue with this for long but Im going to go with the flow and see how I do until december.
I always remember the quote. " let the surgeon gunner idiot do the dissections" and that made life better.