What Do You Mean I Have Work Options? - Some Thoughts for Senior Residents About to Graduate

(Initial caveats: 

The following advice speaks to physicians employed directly by a medical group or hospital. It may not apply to independent contractors or locums physicians.

Also, not all of the work situations I describe will be available in every market. For example, a town with only one hospital may have fewer work situations than a large city with multiple hospitals staffed by multiple groups.)

One of the beautiful things about emergency medicine is that you can adjust your work situation in many ways to suit your life.

What do I mean by work situation? I mean your employment situation.

Most doctors graduate residency and the first thing they will consider is a full-time job at one hospital or with one group that covers multiple hospitals. There’s nothing wrong with the full time job if that’s what suits your situation.

However, sometimes that arrangement doesn’t fit every situation. Here are some alternatives to think about:

Part time work. You can ask for ¾ or ½ time hours. This may be a good situation if you have other time commitments. In some cases, you might be able to get health and dental insurance while being part time. Ask respectfully and the worst thing that can happen is the prospective employer will say “no”.

Per diem work. This is when you are credentialed to work with a hospital or medical group, but do not have a minimum number of hours. The flip side is you will not have a guaranteed number of hours, so the work may not be steady. Depending on the hospital or medical group, you might have a lot of control over what days you can work with them. You might also be restricted to only certain days or shifts. This control over which days or shifts you can work varies from place to place.

You can mix and match these situations:

Two part time jobs or a part time and a per diem or multiple per diem. You can get full time hours or more this way. However, make sure that the schedules are compatible. You do not want to be scheduled for the same day at two different hospitals. Multiple jobs can work when well you can control which days you work.

Full time job with a per diem job. This works well if you need to make a little extra money on the side and you want a little bit of variety beyond what you are getting at your full time job.

We should know what our options are so that we can fit our career to suit our needs, most other fields do not have this luxury. To be stuck in a work situation that does not work for you while there may be other alternatives is an unfortunate situation.

About me: I’m an emergency physician currently practicing in New York City. I have worked some of the variations of work situations I’ve described above. I’m also the author of The Handbook of Medical Charting and A Guide to Clinical Decision Making.