80-hour work week in NY?

[piotr13]

To you all 3rd- and 4th-years, and interns:

I recently read that NY passed a law in 1988 or something which limited the med student's/interns work week to no more than 24 consecutive hours per shift and no more than 80 hours per week. Is this true? Do med schools actually follow this mandate/guidline?
It seems to me (I could be wrong) that many med students still work 100+ hour work weeks....

P.S. On a side note, how do you'all manage it if it is 100+ hours?

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[KyGrlDr2B]

Moving to clinical rotations.

 

[edfig99]

the laws only apply to residents, not medical students. probably subinterns or acting interns are held to the 80hr week just cuz of the nature of the rotation, but otherwise, it's up to the individual medical schools to police their med students.

and all residencies now are required to limit their resident's work hours. maybe the LCME will do something similar for med students in the future.

 

[piotr13]

Man, I sure hope they make a rule like that for the med students..... you think it may come about anytime soon?

 

[lodger]

the rule does not apply to medical students at my school and we will be on for 36+ hours on call days (Q4) for surgery. The chair of the dept said if we follow the rule the residents follow we will miss 1/4 of the cases.

 

[ckent]

Most med students work fewer hours then residents. Even if you do have a few med students violating the 30 hr rule, I doubt if too many are working for more then 80 hrs per week consistently. One of my favorite attendings always liked to remind me that I was here to learn and not to "help out".

 

[piotr13]

Interesting..... so why have I heard so many med students yapping about being up 30+ hours?

 

[ERMudPhud]

Originally posted by piotr13
Interesting..... so why have I heard so many med students yapping about being up 30+ hours?

There is a certain amount of posturing that goes on during third year about who has got the the toughest attending, who has had the worst call, who has done the most/coolest procedures etc...

I went to med school at a conservative old-school place where the med students were expected to do alot but I still got a decent amount of sleep and the calls were no where near as tough as internship.

Even if you take call Q3 or Q4 as a student you probably aren't getting all the pages for floor issues or cross coverage that the intern is and you probably aren't admitting as many patients

 

[Sheon]

Granted as a student 30 hours doesn't involve as much work as if you were an intern or resident, but 30 hours is a looooong time to go without sleep. Furthermore, after working 30 hours you are drained. A 30 hours shift on Monday can leave you exhausted for the remainer of the week, making it difficult to do the NON-SCUT work that one has to do (i.e., study, prepare presentations, spend time with the family, stand up during a 3 hour rounding session, etc.).

One thing I can say is that the 30 hour shift is rare among medical students at my Brooklyn school.

 

[spacetygrss]

Originally posted by Sheon
Granted as a student 30 hours doesn't involve as much work as if you were an intern or resident, but 30 hours is a looooong time to go without sleep. Furthermore, after working 30 hours you are drained. A 30 hours shift on Monday can leave you exhausted for the remainer of the week, making it difficult to do the NON-SCUT work that one has to do (i.e., study, prepare presentations, spend time with the family, stand up during a 3 hour rounding session, etc.).

One thing I can say is that the 30 hour shift is rare among medical students at my Brooklyn school.

Agreed!

I can recall on my Surgery rotation instances when I got there at say 4am on Monday morning, took call that night, and didn't go home until 9pm on Tuesday EVENING. What made it even worse is that the intern with whom I was on call got to go home at like 3 pm post call even though we were up the same amount of time (in fact, as a student I had been there LONGER since we had to pre-round before morning rounds). Our weeks were much longer than 80 hours.

However, I think that it's definitely rotation dependent b/c on Peds we normally worked 10 hour days (6am-4pm) and always went home by 1pm post call.

 

[rubyness]

At the hospitals I've been working in they have been pretty adherent to the 80 hr rules. (In Brooklyn)

In surgery they would tell the on call residents to leave in the morning after rounds. On medicine they would actually overhead page that whoever was post call should leave now.

In neuro it wasn't much of an issue.

I think since the laws have been intact for a while they've become more ingrained into peoples' daily routines and schedules.

 

[squeek]

I'm at a New York school, and the work definitely varied based on the rotation. On medicine, surgery, and ob-gyn, we were told explicitly that "medical students do not fall under the 80-hour work week, and therefore their work hours are not limited," and, boy, was that true. Q3 overnight call on ob-gyn, with no sleep at all, not leaving until noon the next day, back the following day. It was rough.

But psych, peds, etc., were much easier...10 hour days, 5-6 days a week on average.

 

[lurkerboy]

Originally posted by piotr13
To you all 3rd- and 4th-years, and interns:

I recently read that NY passed a law in 1988 or something which limited the med student's/interns work week to no more than 24 consecutive hours per shift and no more than 80 hours per week. Is this true? Do med schools actually follow this mandate/guidline?
It seems to me (I could be wrong) that many med students still work 100+ hour work weeks....

P.S. On a side note, how do you'all manage it if it is 100+ hours?

i agree with the other posts, there is no rule for med students. I had a surgery rotation where the residents scutted us all night and then they went home post-call but I had a required lecture in the afternoon. I had a bunch of 36hr days that month.