r/Residency • u/CrusaderKing1 PGY1 • 2d ago
SIMPLE QUESTION Only 5 weeks left on-call in residency, but I stayed glued to the phone first 7 weeks. How to loosen up?
When we are on-call, we have 2 hospitals including their ED, a plethora of floors, and anything else that comes through the phone.
I never work out on-call, never hang out with people, or basically do anything but stayed glued to the phone even on slow days, weekends, nights, etc.
How do you guys effectively remove yourself from the constant worry of having to answer the phone and continuing on with life?
With only 5 weeks left of on-call in my residency, it might not even matter that much, but I am curious.
I was extremely fortunate to have a residency that only has 12 weeks in 3 years I guess.
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u/grey-doc Attending 2d ago
Go a couple days without the phone, or carry it in a Tupperware box for a day. Your brain will reset.
Change your ring tone.
Mind you any time you hear the original tone you can expect PTSD flashbacks. Not sure when those fade.
Sign a job that doesn't do call in a way that will be triggering.
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u/shawnthesheepnudi 1d ago
12 weeks of call in 3 years?!? Fuck
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u/CrusaderKing1 PGY1 1d ago
It's really 12 weeks in 1 year, as the 2nd and 3rd years take none.
For example, I took 3 weeks and 2 holidays of call just this month.
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u/shawnthesheepnudi 12h ago
Apples to oranges, I just didn’t know that was what IM call was like. We were q3-q5 for 4 years straight.
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u/No_Yam_980 2d ago
Wait only 5 weeks left? What you're describing is intern or fresh pgy2 level call anxiety. Unless ur like a super critical field (covering codes/rrts/emergent surgical shit/stoke call) with low or absent attending support...aka its always stressful.
Idk my first couple 24hrs were like that when I started...but now I'm knocked the fuck out in my call room between those literal noises from Satan's den that magically start to uptrend around 2:30 am (my call pings) hahaha
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u/Ok-Preparation-8892 Attending 2d ago
I never figured it out in residency, but we only ever had in house call so it’s more expected to stay in work mode the entire time. It was easier to try to get some sleep at night the last two years once I wasn’t first call.
Now that I’m on call for up to a week+ at a time, I still find I check my phone frequently and never leave it far away when I’m on call. I do try to make time to live as normally as possible. I just make sure I am in a situation where I can get to the hospital asap if needed (will drive instead of walk to the gym, keep a pair of scrubs in the car, if I go out to eat, I’ll pay at the beginning in case i have to leave quickly, etc.) Still hard to not feel paranoid that I’ll miss something, though.