Options for Emergency Physicians during pregnancy

[han14tra]

My husband and I are about to start trying to conceive our first child. I'm worried about continuing to work in emergency medicine due to the stress, night shifts, long hours, potential exposure to diseases, and lack of back up at my single coverage place. Does anyone have advice? I'm considering doing a 911 telehealth job where EMS routes low-acuity complaints to telehealth rather than transporting to the ER. Does anyone have telehealth experience? Is the pay comparable?

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[Brigade4Radiant]

Most telehealth companies pay 25-45 per call. It depends on how busy the service is as well

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

My husband and I are about to start trying to conceive our first child. I'm worried about continuing to work in emergency medicine due to the stress, night shifts, long hours, potential exposure to diseases, and lack of back up at my single coverage place. Does anyone have advice? I'm considering doing a 911 telehealth job where EMS routes low-acuity complaints to telehealth rather than transporting to the ER. Does anyone have telehealth experience? Is the pay comparable?

Pay will be lower doing telemedicine, maybe 1/2 to 2/3 typical ED salary? But that’s a really interesting concept re: EMS.

 

[nVictus]

Telehealth will pay per call or per script/chart you close out. It's about 1/2 the typical ED pay. If you do a lot of volume, you can hit around average EM annual pay... But putting more hours, albeit easier/lower stress.

You also need to get multiple state licenses and prob upfront cost 20-30k in licensing fees if you can't get a company to reimburse you.

Companies are also currently transitioning to hiring more NPs than docs. Pay will go down.

 

[Brigade4Radiant]

Telehealth will pay per call or per script/chart you close out. It's about 1/2 the typical ED pay. If you do a lot of volume, you can hit around average EM annual pay... But putting more hours, albeit easier/lower stress.

You also need to get multiple state licenses and prob upfront cost 20-30k in licensing fees if you can't get a company to reimburse you.

Companies are also currently transitioning to hiring more NPs than docs. Pay will go down.

Most companies won’t reimburse you since your 1099 and while there are NP and PAs in telehealth services advertise by being able to speak with a doctor

Telehealth may go down but urgent care and ER visits will be affected First since there is pressure about decreasing urgent care and ER visits to urgent care.

 

[Kryptocoin]

My husband and I are about to start trying to conceive our first child. I'm worried about continuing to work in emergency medicine due to the stress, night shifts, long hours, potential exposure to diseases, and lack of back up at my single coverage place. Does anyone have advice? I'm considering doing a 911 telehealth job where EMS routes low-acuity complaints to telehealth rather than transporting to the ER. Does anyone have telehealth experience? Is the pay comparable?

Consider joining a concierge or DPC practice. Few ER doctors do that on the side.

 

[Backpack234]

Consider joining a concierge or DPC practice. Few ER doctors do that on the side.

how would an ER doc even start doing primary care?

 

[miacomet]

My husband and I are about to start trying to conceive our first child. I'm worried about continuing to work in emergency medicine due to the stress, night shifts, long hours, potential exposure to diseases, and lack of back up at my single coverage place. Does anyone have advice? I'm considering doing a 911 telehealth job where EMS routes low-acuity complaints to telehealth rather than transporting to the ER. Does anyone have telehealth experience? Is the pay comparable?

I'd be more worried about getting pregnant- night shifts decrease fertility.

I would agree- leave EM. I had a female colleague with four kids, don't know how she did it. But I would look for something else. You will take a huge pay cut.

 

[collegestud2013]

My husband and I are about to start trying to conceive our first child. I'm worried about continuing to work in emergency medicine due to the stress, night shifts, long hours, potential exposure to diseases, and lack of back up at my single coverage place. Does anyone have advice? I'm considering doing a 911 telehealth job where EMS routes low-acuity complaints to telehealth rather than transporting to the ER. Does anyone have telehealth experience? Is the pay comparable?

Telemedicine pay will generally be much lower per hour as an employed physician. Market seems to be saturated right now with much more providers jumping on it than patients. I'm guessing as EM-trained, you would be doing acute care medicine visits (which IM and FM trained can work too), and as others have said there's a push for NPs and PAs to take more of those visits since they're essentially visits that could be handled by urgent care. Pay is usually a bit lower than hospitalist pay per hour and definitely much less than working in ED, especially at the beginning if you don't have many state licenses and thus your patient volume is limited. That's the tradeoff you'll have to take for being able to work from home and in lower-stress environment. Besides that there's a host of non-clinical work physicians can do, but in the vast majority of cases it would involve taking a pay cut initially compared to working in the ED.

 

[sloh]

Telemedicine pay will generally be much lower per hour as an employed physician. Market seems to be saturated right now with much more providers jumping on it than patients. I'm guessing as EM-trained, you would be doing acute care medicine visits (which IM and FM trained can work too), and as others have said there's a push for NPs and PAs to take more of those visits since they're essentially visits that could be handled by urgent care. Pay is usually a bit lower than hospitalist pay per hour and definitely much less than working in ED, especially at the beginning if you don't have many state licenses and thus your patient volume is limited. That's the tradeoff you'll have to take for being able to work from home and in lower-stress environment. Besides that there's a host of non-clinical work physicians can do, but in the vast majority of cases it would involve taking a pay cut initially compared to working in the ED.

Can you expand on this?

 

[collegestud2013]

Can you expand on this?

This would be an entire new thread of its own and there's lots of forums out there talking about how to get into non-clinical side gigs. Some popular ones for physicians that come to mind include consulting, expert witness, utilization management for insurance companies, medical tech/device or pharmaceutical development, but obviously there's a lot more out others there. Most will require skillsets beyond just clinical practice and involve networking to get, and for the most part will tend to only be part time when starting out don't expect to make a full $300-500k to replace a full-time physician pay with your side gig if you're jumping into it for your first year. Most physicians will gradually transition into non-clinical role (eg part time clinical and part-time non-clinical).

 

[Tenk]

Pay is bad. You’d be better off doing urgent care. Good hours and no nights. Also far less chance of violence.

 

[han14tra]

We tried for a baby the first time last month, and we're pregnant! I'm already experiencing morning sickness. Any tips for how to survive working in emergency medicine while pregnant?

 

[cyanide12345678]

We tried for a baby the first time last month, and we're pregnant! I'm already experiencing morning sickness. Any tips for how to survive working in emergency medicine while pregnant?

Id be more worried about the first 6 months of the baby, the exhaustion, sleeplessness with the circadian rhythm disruptions.

Ask for part time 8-10 shifts a month especially as you near delivery. Take a minimum of 3-4 months off after delivery, if not more.

 

[psychemdoc]

We tried for a baby the first time last month, and we're pregnant! I'm already experiencing morning sickness. Any tips for how to survive working in emergency medicine while pregnant?

Just wanted to say congratulations and I’m very excited for you!

 

[DetroitERDO]

We tried for a baby the first time last month, and we're pregnant! I'm already experiencing morning sickness. Any tips for how to survive working in emergency medicine while pregnant?

Congratulations, this is wonderful news !!

As a fellow emergency medicine lady doc I can tell you its exhausting. The first 12 weeks basically I would come home from working my shifts and sleep as much as I could. I tried to utilize help (have family or friends run errands and buying mostly online whenever possible, believe me this helps once the kiddo is here. Have your partner step it up for things if you can, I had my husband even go and put gas in the car when he was available (he's non medical and has bankers hours)

For morning sickness I had zofran on hand and used the ginger candies and crackers during my shift. I found that to be helpful. Its hard to get up and use the bathroom a lot but I take me phone and most staff can easily get in touch with me.

Feel free to DM me if you want more and just remember , YOU CAN DO THIS !!!

 

[CoolDoc1729]

We tried for a baby the first time last month, and we're pregnant! I'm already experiencing morning sickness. Any tips for how to survive working in emergency medicine while pregnant?

Congratulations.

I think if your health permits(not diabetic) sipping on icees or the like helps a lot - I honestly survived on icees with my first pregnancy. After baby comes I’d recommend going back half time after 8-12 weeks off and only working 1-2 shifts in a row - it will kill milk supply if you try to work more than that.

Feel free to DM me. I have four kids 9/7/5/4 work full time all nights and honestly don’t feel like it’s a problem as long as you have your priorities in clear order. You got this

 

[wareagle726]

Congratulations.

I think if your health permits(not diabetic) sipping on icees or the like helps a lot - I honestly survived on icees with my first pregnancy. After baby comes I’d recommend going back half time after 8-12 weeks off and only working 1-2 shifts in a row - it will kill milk supply if you try to work more than that.

Feel free to DM me. I have four kids 9/7/5/4 work full time all nights and honestly don’t feel like it’s a problem as long as you have your priorities in clear order. You got this

Moms are amazing. I don't know how y'all do it. My wife is non-medical and only "works" a few days a week but takes amazing care of our kids and works way harder than I do. You all deserve all the credit.