Why I could not do surgery….
Ok so I believe that most doctors are working in an area of specialization that they are comfortable with.
It is really important that you understand that when you complete medical school and start residency, you are gonna be stuck doing that for the rest of your life….
So you better be sure that is what you want to do.
That is why you have the ‘clinical years’. When you should be exposed to most if not all of the different areas in medicine. So, choose wisely.
I initially wanted to do surgery. I planned my surgical rotations to be second cycle of rotations in my third year. And for my fourth year, instead of chilling out, I planned some tough sub-internships in surgery, trauma surgery, and I also stuck in ER at a level 1 trauma hospital. Basically I wanted a way to still watch the surgeons work.
I think, if you have an idea of which field you want to focus on in medicine, you really should zone in on it during those clinical years.
During the middle of my fourth year, after all those surgical rotations were over, it hit me. I hated surgery. I hated staying up late into the night. I hated being stuck at the hospital for too long. I hated not seeing the sun rise or fall. I had to wakeup at 3:30am to be at the hospital by 4:00am. Then if I wasn’t oncall, I did not leave until around 6:30pm- 7:30pm. If I was oncall….ugh!!!! I was stuck straight through the morning after my call.
It drove me nuts.
But….remember I stuck that ER rotation in there. Who knew……I loved ER. I could do procedures AND I worked on a clock.
I wasn’t stuck at the hospital whole week. Just maybe 3 sessions a week. It was interesting. I saw different patients daily. It was a dream come true.
And then it dawned on me that ER, not surgery, was the residency for me.
Who would have ever thought……..
Sleepy ER Doctor Diaries 