Congratulations

[oceanchild]

I think the new rules are 60 hour weeks and 12 hour shifts? In peds it seems to be forcing everyone to night float. And in DH's program, it basically means you never get two days off in a row. I am huge advocate of reducing hours but not crazy about these rules.

Anyway, DH is officially half way through residency. Which would be more exciting if he weren't doing a fellowship.

ETA: The internet says 16 hour shifts. 80 hour weeks stay.

Yeah we finished our first 6 months of residency! Only 5.5 more years to go!

DH said interns will no longer be able to take in house call - it doesn't affect his specialty because NSG interns (at least here) don't take in house call until PGY-2 but my understanding is that the new regs are quite strict. DH was reading an article on them the other night I'll get him to send it to me.

Not to hijack but my husband takes the brunt of in house call as the NSG intern and we are both dreading next year when he will have to do it again and the incoming intern will not. This year is slightly better because the one or two months he is with another surgical specialty he takes call with them, otherwise it's with NSG, next year it will ALL be with NSG and he will be one of the only juniors taking in house call. Ugh, I'm not looking forward to the PGY-2 year much.

[GreyhoundsRUs]

ETA: The internet says 16 hour shifts. 80 hour weeks stay.

I also think there are some type of changes with reporting which will make it harder to fudge your numbers. DH's program had it pretty sweet - PGY1's have all weekend call (when not on Gen Surg)- and PGY2's have only weekday call...that will be going bye-bye

[scarlett09]

Yay, we are halfway to the end of residency! You too Julia!!

Here's the official version from ACGME: http://acgme-2010standards.org/approved-standards.html
There is even a handy version that compares these new standards to resident life back in 2003.

PGY-1 can only work 16 hour shifts, but everyone else can work 24 hour shifts. No more than 6 consecutive nights of night float () and nothing more than Q3 for PGY-2 and up. But what doesn't make sense to me is the minimum amount of hours you must have off post-call. I always thought it was 24 hours that you had to be "off"?

As Julia stated, this is pushing us towards night float, which I loathe. Honestly, DH has never had a 30 hour shift until PICU rotations this year (PL-2), so that won't be a huge issue (most calls are 24 hours). But I'm curious to see how the 16-hour shifts are handled for things like overnight calls that only PL-1s provide coverage for (delivery room) as well as any weekend or holiday call. It looks as though the burden of those hours will fall to the PL-2 and PL-3s.

Anyway, congrats to all of you who are very close to the end (and new beginnings) and to those of you who are getting very close to getting through intern year!!

[blondie]

Congrats ladies!! Made it 6 months through his first year of residency.....3.5 years to go!!

Do they really regulate your spouse's hours because of the new laws or just for show? My husband is an oral surgery resident which is a dental specialty, so even though it is in a hospital they don't have any regulations. They seriously work them!

[Mrs. MD, Esq.]

Thanks for the link...now I (kind of) know what to expect for hours come July. This still seems insane to me. I really don't know how doctors deal with these types of schedules (let alone the hours before the most recent change)!

[scarlett09]

Do they really regulate your spouse's hours because of the new laws or just for show?

In my experience, they actually have to log the hours with the program and the program must report them to ACGME. Violations can lead to serious repercussions for the program. However, I am sure some folks will say that their spouse logs hours just for show and then does some form of "math" to turn 110 hours into 80.

[scarlett09]

Thanks for the link...now I (kind of) know what to expect for hours come July. This still seems insane to me. I really don't know how doctors deal with these types of schedules (let alone the hours before the most recent change)!

Try being in residency when there was NO limit to the number of hours a resident could work in a week! Scary to think about - we are lucky to be in residency at this point in time. Some folks here could tell you about their experiences during that time, but I am sure they would probably prefer not to think about it too much. People here survived that, the current rules regarding work hours, and will survive the new rules too.

Hey Scarlett - *mwah*.

There's a big group of us that try to avoid starting sentences with "Back in my day ...". . That said, there are also still many programs that don't abide by the rules, so I think the "lucky" ones are specifically at programs where they actually follow the rules!!!

[weeniegeniewife]

We get in our cars and leave Rochester headed for Portland on June 28th!

(Now I'm going to have to put that in my signature!)

[scarlett09]

Hey Scarlett - *mwah*.

There's a big group of us that try to avoid starting sentences with "Back in my day ...". . That said, there are also still many programs that don't abide by the rules, so I think the "lucky" ones are specifically at programs where they actually follow the rules!!!

Right back at ya!

[oceanchild]

PGY-1 can only work 16 hour shifts, but everyone else can work 24 hour shifts. No more than 6 consecutive nights of night float () and nothing more than Q3 for PGY-2 and up. But what doesn't make sense to me is the minimum amount of hours you must have off post-call. I always thought it was 24 hours that you had to be "off"?

As Julia stated, this is pushing us towards night float, which I loathe. Honestly, DH has never had a 30 hour shift until PICU rotations this year (PL-2), so that won't be a huge issue (most calls are 24 hours). But I'm curious to see how the 16-hour shifts are handled for things like overnight calls that only PL-1s provide coverage for (delivery room) as well as any weekend or holiday call. It looks as though the burden of those hours will fall to the PL-2 and PL-3s.

The between shifts part seems to be requiring a calendar day, instead of just the hours, right? I read it kind of quickly.

This is already a night float program, so that part isn't that big of a deal here. Just a few intern rotations that will have to change. My DH has been on a rescheduling committee (lord, the boy loves committees), and they basically couldn't come up with any way to do golden weekends. As someone who only gets weekends off, that seems like a big loss to me. I'm glad we're missing it.

By hubby's IM program leads to occassional violation of the work hours, but the residents all try to protect the program. Its not really so bad for them, but I've heard of some programs that are just outrageous.

[scarlett09]

The between shifts part seems to be requiring a calendar day, instead of just the hours, right? I read it kind of quickly.

This is already a night float program, so that part isn't that big of a deal here. Just a few intern rotations that will have to change. My DH has been on a rescheduling committee (lord, the boy loves committees), and they basically couldn't come up with any way to do golden weekends. As someone who only gets weekends off, that seems like a big loss to me. I'm glad we're missing it.

No, I think everyone has to have 8-10 hours between shifts, and 14 or more if they are on-call in house for 24 hours. That is what I understood - I had always thought it was a calendar day too.

DH just told me he is sitting in on some duty hours meeting this week too, woohoo. I hear you on the weekends part, but at least there is only one year of it - could you imagine being a PL-1 right now and after having a year with golden weekends, you had two years without? That would majorly suck. And I'm not sure what you mean by "missing it", as these new duty hours restrictions go into effect July 1.