Thursday, May 23, 2013

Why Emergency Room Doctors Love Their Jobs

By Amy Cline


Most emergency room doctors say the same thing when asked what they like about being an ER physician. The thrill of the unknown and the uncertainty of what will walk through the door during each shift is what seems to attract physicians to emergency medicine. Emergency room doctors love the fast pace, excitement and unpredictability of a day in the emergency department.

Because of the diversity in an emergency room, a physician needs to have expertise in almost every area of medicine. One minute you could be attending to a toddler with the flu...another day, a victim of a serious car accident. Applying their knowledge, an emergency room doctor can act quickly and efficiently.

Thanks to modern technology, emergency medicine specialists can begin treating patients at the scene of an accident or in the ambulance by relaying orders to an emergency medical technician or EMT. Emergency Room doctors can take control of the situation without being physicially present to help them.

The emergency medicine specialty is a fairly new one in the field of medicine. Prior to this specialty becoming it's own category, emergency rooms were staffed by physicians trained in other specialties. While these doctors no doubt did the best they could, they are not specially trained to handle acute emergencies such as patients who have stopped breathing, or who have suffered severe trauma.

That situation began to change in 1979 when The American Board of Medical Specialties recognized emergency medicine as the nation's 23rd medical specialty. Just like any other specialty, emergency room doctors must complete residency programs of 3-4 years before they can be placed in jobs in hospital emergency rooms across the country. Residency programs which combine emergency medicine and another specialty such as pediatrics or internal medicine are also available. These programs are typically five years long and result in dual certification. There are also fellowships following residency which lead to subspecialty certification in Medical Toxicology, Pediatric Emergency Medicine and Sports Medicine.

Exposure to a plethora of emergencies requires emergency medicine residents to rotate through emergency departments, intensive care units, pediatric and obstetric units. Emergency room doctors will find themselves handling medical, surgical and even psychiatric emergencies. It is necessary for emergency room physicians to see other departments in action to gain the knowledge they will need to handle emergencies in the ER.

Emergency room doctors like the ability to plan their personal lives around their schedule because they have fixed shifts given well in advance. Although the hours are long, and require working on weekends, nights and holidays, the prefer that to an "on-call" schedule.

An American Medical Association survey states that 87% of emergency room doctors feel their jobs met their expectations. On a scale of 1-"very unsatisfied" to 5="very unsatisfied" , the physician surveyed averaged 3.8.




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