Tag: radiology

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Are Less Paperwork And EHR Selling Features For The Radiology Specialty?

paperwork

As I was scrolling through some random Twitter feeds that came up in my email, I saw the following statement come up from a fellow physician: “Physicians should not use the amount of paperwork as means to decide on which specialty they should choose.” Well, as I stared at this statement, I became more and more incensed. Why? Because many burgeoning medical students were possibly looking at this Twitter feed. And, some may utilize this suggestion as they search for their specialty of choice. Meanwhile, this statement/question could not have been further from the truth. An excessive amount of paperwork could ruin the most glamorous and exciting medical specialty work.

High Paperwork Burden And Electronics Health Records (EHR) Use Is A Cause For Burnout

One of the main reasons for burnout and lack of interest in a specialty is the excessive paperwork and the inordinate number of clicks on an EHR system. This person suggested that medical students should ignore this factor and go into a subspecialty regardless. Now, I don’t know about you. But, for me, one of the best parts of radiology is having to deal with much less paperwork than our colleagues in other subspecialties. I delight in not having to constantly document interactions with patients and write tons of prescriptions, and mull through a myriad of HIPAA forms every day. These are tasks that would have made me miserable. And, we, as radiologists, do not have nearly as many of these issues as other subspecialties.

Of course, I also chose radiology based on the diversity, large information base, and my interest in technology. But, if I knew at that time that we had so much less paperwork than most other specialties, that would have indeed reinforced my decision. I certainly would use it as a way to choose between several subspecialties of interest!

Should We Use The Benefit Of Less Paperwork To Our Advantage In Recruitment?

Now, telling medical students that they should choose our specialty because we have less paperwork is like saying to become a secretary because you get to sit down all day. Sure, it is a perk of the job, but not the reason for joining our fold. But if presented in the right way and placed in the context of how other specialties have to deal with the work daily, it could become a game-changer. Have a student ask an internal medicine doctor how much time you spend on dictating reports and phone calls. And then have them sit with them while they are doing these tasks. The amount of time spent away from the more exciting patient care activities may shock them!

Then, have a student sit next to a radiologist on any given day. And let them see the amount of time we get to spend on patient care activities such as looking at films and performing procedures. They will see a significant difference between the amount of paperwork and EHR time. Then, they can use these factors as a valid means to deciding on which specialty is right for them.

Let The Student Decide On A Specialty Based On The Facts!

We all should choose a specialty in medicine based on the facts, not on emotion alone. One of those critical factors is the amount of paperwork and EHR. It is a pressing problem. And, pundits should not gloss over the unenticing aspects of a specialty. Practicing a medical specialty is not just about the glorified moments in the operating room or with a patient.

In reality, you can’t always do only the things you love. You also need to accept the facts of any specialty. And, if excessive paperwork is one of those realities, students need to know about it and make an informed decision. Negative information cannot just be swept under a rug when you make your specialty choice!

 

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What Are The Best Extracurriculars For Radiology?

extracurriculars

Question About The Best Extracurriculars:

 Hello Dr. Julius. I am an incoming MS1 interested in radiology, and I wondered if you had any recommendations for medical school extracurriculars that radiology residency directors highly value. Having talked to several medical students about their extracurriculars, there seems to be a wide variety of options. I know that I will be swamped in medical school and only have time for a few activities. I would love to know if any extracurriculars would be particularly helpful in preparing me for radiology. Thank you!

 

Answer:

Radiology Relevant Extracurriculars

There are two types of extracurricular activities that radiology program directors like to see. The first are those that are relevant to radiology. These would include research, participating in national radiology specialty conferences, etc. These show a depth of interest in radiology and not just taking a two or 4-week rotation.

Non-Radiology Relevant Extracurriculars 

The second of those extracurriculars that you do that may have nothing whatsoever to do radiology but are something that you have explored profoundly and have been successful performing. It could be music but not just strumming a guitar. Maybe you have played in Carnegie Hall or were doing vocals for a cover band. Or, if it is astronomy, you don’t just look at stars at nighttime. But maybe you are actively involved in searching for new planets and found one that has your name!

I am trying to point out that we like to see that you have other interests outside of radiology that make you not just another number but also an interesting person. And that you want to do things, not just superficially, but will work at it to get better and better. These second sorts of interests are so important because we can sit with you for hours at a time. And, we want to make sure that we will like the person that is by our side and have a person there that will work hard for the residency program. 

The Crux Of The Matter 

So, get involved in some radiology-specific research or organizations if you can. But, also explore things that interest you like to do on the side. Doing too much and mastering nothing does not mean much. But, someone that pursues their interests to the nth degree, now that is special.

Even after all this discussion, more important than all the extracurriculars in the world, is doing well in your medical school and getting good grades for the Dean’s letter and good board scores (correlated with passing the core radiology examination). So, don’t forget about the basics!

 

Good luck,

Barry Julius, MD

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Can I Use Psychiatry As A Clinical Year Before Starting Radiology?

psychiatry

Question About Psychiatry Clinical Year

Hi Dr. Julius,

I initially matched into Psychiatry residency. However, I decided that Psychiatry was not for me and left after an intern year (which included two months of IM wards, one month of outpatient medicine, two months of Neuro, one month of ER, and six months of inpatient Psych) to serve as a GP for four years in the Air Force. I now plan to apply to Radiology. Will I be expected to repeat my intern year?

 

Answer

You posed an interesting dilemma about using psychiatry as a clinical year. If you look at the Radiology ACGME statement, which is as follows:

To be eligible for appointment to the program, residents must have successfully completed a prerequisite year of direct patient care in a program that satisfies the requirements in III.A.2. in emergency medicine, family medicine, internal medicine, neurology, obstetrics and gynecology, pediatrics, surgery or surgical specialties, the transitional year, or any combination of these.

This statement does consider psychiatry as an appropriate substitute for an internship year. However, it appears that you did spend a good chunk of the year on clinical care.

So, I would recommend the following: Give the ACGME a call and determine if you could count that year toward the program requirement (especially since you did have substantial non-psych months). On occasion, they do grant exceptions if you could prove that you spent the year performing direct clinical care. It’s worth a try.

If they approve only part of a year, that could be a problem. Why? Because it leaves you with half a year that you still need to complete. It may be hard to find a residency slot to fill up half a year of requirements only. Nevertheless, you never know what they will say. I would be interested to know how it turns out!

Regards,

Barry Julius, MD

 

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Seven Ways Administration Can Destroy A Radiology Residency Program

administration

Like it or not, all radiology programs need the backing of their administrators to succeed. Unless faculty and residents want to pay for residency out of their own pockets and manage all the day-to-day issues themselves, it is the only way to survive. So, with all this power in the hands of the administrators, it is no wonder that they can direct a residency in ways they see fit. And they can use their power for the good of the program or to the detriment of everyone. So, if you are wondering how the administration can pull strings to destroy a radiology residency program, here are the top seven ways!

Lack Of Financial Support

Unfortunately, a residency cannot run itself without money. Whether it is the reading resources, Radexam, equipment, or teaching, all these line items cost money. If the administration takes all the money for themselves and is unwilling to cough it up for the residency program, a residency cannot continue functioning.

Lack Of Human Resources

It’s not all about equipment and stuff. It would help if you also had the workforce to make a residency function. These folks include program directors, residency coordinators, faculty, statisticians, and more. If you can’t hire or maintain these folks, you may as well pack it all in!

Unrealistic Expectations By The Administration

We all want the best for our residents. But, when administrators expect to create an academic powerhouse but are unwilling to hire the proper faculty, or if you want a class of incredible residents but are not willing to pay for the latest and greatest equipment and technology, do not expect to create a residency that will function!

Administration Culture Clash/Backseat Driving

Administrators and faculty often have different ideas about how to run a program. Just because you, as an administrator, provide the funds to operate a radiology residency doesn’t mean you can control everything. For instance, recruiting residents from only certain institutions because you get a kickback doesn’t work.

And, just because you, as a radiologist or program director, think you know everything about running a residency doesn’t mean you know enough about managing a program’s business. Spending money without controls can lead to poor hospital financial outcomes. Either side pulling all the strings can lead to a disaster!

No Backup For Program Directors/Department

To maintain respectability within an institution, program directors need support from their administration. They may encounter problems getting a statistician to help residents with studies to meet the requirements of the ACGME. Perhaps there are conflicts with another department overstepping its bounds and using radiology residents for non-educational purposes. In either case, the administration must back up the program directors and radiology department to maintain the department.

Unwilling To Update Old Equipment To Save A Buck

Yes, institutions do like to keep that ancient CT scanner or MRI. Why? Well, it becomes a cash cow when it is all paid off. No more hardware expenses mean higher profit margins. But there comes a time when you are just out-of-date and can’t keep up with the competition. And guess what? That also affects the residency. Residents don’t get the training they need, and fewer patients come to the institution because they don’t get the advanced imaging they need!

Loathe To Adopt New Technologies- Too Many Hoops

Sometimes, you need to adopt new technologies, but there is so much bureaucracy that you can never push the capital budget through. Perhaps the administration makes it so hard to obtain the correct paperwork. Or maybe they only meet in committee once every six months and are not quick to decide. In any event, if you snooze, you lose!

Yes, Administration Can Destroy A Radiology Residency Program!

Radiology residency programs are only as good as their weakest link. And if that link is the administration, the whole residency can fall apart. Whether the issues are financial, cultural, or bureaucratic, each factor can result in the program’s demise. So, when you choose a training program, make sure to look into who administers it!

 

 

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Presumptions About Our Radiology Colleagues Can Sow The Seeds Of Destruction!

presumptions

First and foremost, radiologists are people. And, people make presumptions about others, whether it is colleagues, leaders, or friends. It’s just human nature. However, it is also one of the biggest mistakes that one can make in business, particularly in private radiology practice. We all think that we know what kind of job our colleagues do. And, we base many of these stereotypes on miscommunication and pure conjecture. All this can lead to bad blood and, even worse, lousy practice outcomes. So, let’s go through the main reasons why presuming to know our fellow radiologist’s job is so dangerous to the practice and business of radiology?

Ways That Presumptions Damage A Practice

You Do Less Than Me!

If you like toxicity, this unfounded statement can spread the most venom to the rest of your colleagues. And, most of the time, it is not valid. Everyone does work a bit differently. So, work can be hard to quantify.

Moreover, this statement decreases everyone’s incentive to work. Who wants to work when everyone else does less? Of course, maybe there is one outlier in your practice that does a lot less. But, if you are always going to worry about everyone else, what is the incentive for you to work?

The Work They Do At The Other Practice Down The Street Isn’t Hard.

You can never tell for sure how hard work that some other practice is doing is difficult or not. Indeed, it is even worse to make that presumption. Has your practice ever tried starting a thriving vein center? It’s effortless to create one for yourself. Well, there is probably a lot more to the process than you think. Without doing the research, this assumption is a surefire way to lose a lot of money and time, not being prepared for the work you will need to succeed!

Presumptions That Administrative And Teaching Roles Are Not Real Work

This one is a real doozie. Almost every program director throughout the country has been the brunt of this presumption at one time or another. Yes, we are not constantly pumping out RVUs. But instead, we are teaching, fielding all the requests and complaints, and completing all the paperwork. A residency can fall apart without these services. It is not the same as reading films, but yes, it is real work!

MR, IR, Nuclear Medicine, Mammo, Etc. Are Easy

One way to get into trouble, presume that other radiologist’s area of expertise is simple. You don’t know until you work in the field. Think mammo is easy? Wait until your first lawsuit? And, MRI is not complex, right? Just wait until you miss your first subtle neural tumor. Every field has its challenges. And, each needs a lot of practice to become good at it!

It Doesn’t Matter That He Has The Ear Of The Referrer; I Work Harder

It’s not always just about the amount of work that you do. It is also about the perceived quality of your work. That radiologist that always gets phone calls to consult with referrers? There is probably a reason for that! Maybe he’s just friendly. But maybe, just maybe, he knows a lot. And perhaps he knows a lot more than you! You lose his expertise, and you start losing patients from your practice. It doesn’t matter how hard you work!

Presumptions About Our Radiology Colleagues: Sowing The Seeds Of Destruction!

Yes, presuming to know what your friends down the hall do on a day-to-day basis is fraught with danger. And, you probably know less than you think you do about your colleague’s issues. So, if you want to take this path, be very wary of the dangers above. It’s a surefire way to add to a toxic workplace!

 

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Should Residencies Ever Rehire A Resident That Previously Left?

rehire

What is so special about the radiology resident when it comes to rehiring? Moreover, if a resident finds himself in a situation where he leaves and subsequently wants to go back, is it ever appropriate for a residency to rehire this individual? To answer these questions, let’s first discuss why residencies are so different from a regular job when rehiring.  

Why Rehiring Is So Different For Residencies?

Rehiring at a typical job and residency is not the same. For residencies, each post-graduate year has a distinct service role and responsibility that the program needs to fill, different from most jobs. Additionally, since residency is not just service (unlike a typical job), the resident also needs to meet educational qualifications in any given year. For some programs, that might mean passing specific procedural and cognitive activities. Finally, residents may need to fulfill designated milestones of differing responsibilities at each institution. So, residents are not easily interchangeable, and rehiring during residency can be challenging.

Additionally, when one leaves and wants to come back later, your program may not have the educational or financial resources to compensate the resident. For example, if you complete a different residency year and then return to radiology residency, Medicare may no longer fund your position. Or educationally speaking, a first-year most often cannot substitute for a third-year resident spot that might be open and vice versa. All these issues can also stand in the way of a rehire.

When Can A Residency Program Rehire A Former Resident?

Now that you can understand why rehiring might be so tricky, let’s discuss some of the situations that residencies might encounter that would enable the residency program to rehire a former resident. Three of these circumstances are a coincidental fortune, grants and opportunities, and institutional policies. We will go through each one of these in particular.

Coincidental Fortune

Sometimes all the stars align that allow a program to rehire a resident. Let’s take the example of a resident that was let go because of failing the Step III USMLE. At some institutions, residents need to pass the test before they reach their PGY-3 year. So, hospitals are not obligated to rehire individuals who do not pass their Step III boards after starting their PGY 3 year. 

But, let’s say the resident who failed initially was in good standing up until the boards and then passed their boards well into their PGY-3 year. Then, suppose the residency program has not filled that spot, and the former resident applied to it again after passing. In that case, the resident could be fortunate enough to retake their place (albeit possibly graduate later.) The story could have also ended without the resident able to retake their spot if it was no longer available. It was luck that enables the resident to get their job back again.

Grants And Opportunities

Other times, different programs have opportunities built into them to rehire residents after a specified amount of time. Perhaps, it is a year of international volunteering as a radiologist. Or, a resident may take off a year to complete a permissible research project in the institution. In these specific situations, programs can rehire their residents after they fulfill their time.

Institutional Policies

Finally, some institutions may have specific policies that forbid a resident from being fired. Perhaps, a residency suspends a resident but has done so without the appropriate documentation to do so. Other by-laws may force due process before termination (as long as it does not jeopardize patient care!) Specific policies in place at the hospital such as these can cause the rehiring of a resident.

To Rehire Former Residents: Not So Simple!

Residencies are much more than a typical job because of their education as well as service requirements. Therefore, rehiring former residents can present multiple obstacles due to the nuances of radiology residencies. Given these obstacles, don’t expect to regain your former position unless you do your due diligence to ensure that you still have a spot. Rehiring at a residency program is not the norm!

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Teaching In Radiology: How Can Residencies Help To Prepare?

teaching in radiology

Question About Teaching In Radiology

Hi Dr. Julius,

I am an MS3 who is planning on going into radiology, have always loved teaching, and want to make it a large part of my career. I was hoping to hear your take on how radiologists can teach and any tips to shape my career with this goal in mind.

 

Answer

“What kind of teaching opportunities do you have?” is a common question that I get from my interview candidates for residency every year. Teaching is a large part of learning in most radiology programs. Almost all programs have some form of teaching opportunities. These may manifest as teaching medical students, junior residents from different specialties rotating through your department, or interdepartmental tumor boards. Regardless, you will find many opportunities to teach.

Community Vs. Academic Teaching In Radiology

So what is the difference between programs and the different teaching opportunities? Well, it comes down to the sort of teaching. More community programs tend to give you less opportunity to teach students because they may not be affiliated with a medical school. Instead, you will have more opportunities to teach technologists, nurses, and fellow physicians. And, the options tend to be less formal. 

On the other hand, academic programs give you more formal opportunities to teach and mentor research projects and other academic members within your residency, such as students, observers, fellows, and more that you would not get at a community program. And, teaching can be in larger forums. The bottom line is that teaching opportunities are not unique to one type of program or another. The styles just depend on your inclinations and your choice of program. 

Stop And Smell The Roses (And Teach!)

I believe that each resident that comes through a program should stop and take the opportunity to teach others. Teaching others reinforces what you know and helps your fellow man or woman. Plus, you wind up hearing or asking questions that you may never have thought about in the first place. These questions make for promising research projects or take you to places that will make you understand ideas more deeply than you ever thought possible. The rewards are invaluable, and the time it takes to do so is relatively negligible. 

Then, when you finish your residency, you can decide for yourself if you want to take more opportunities to teach either in academic or private practice. They are all around you. It’s a matter of what you want to pursue in your career. 

 

My forty-three cents on teaching,

Barry Julius, MD

 

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Postponed COMLEX Due To Covid: What Do I Do?

postponed COMLEX

Question About Postponed COMLEX:

Hello, I am DO third year medical student interested in radiology. However, I worry about the current situation that I put myself in. During this COVID summer, exam dates got thoroughly messed up to the point where my COMLEX was pushed back two times, leaving me with the decision to delay the beginning of my third year to take Step I or to leave it and focus on COMLEX 1. I chose the latter decision because I was thoroughly exhausted from studying due to my postponed COMLEX. Unfortunately, I received a low score and have dug a relatively large hole for myself.

I know that trying to take Steps I, II, and COMLEX 2 is not an option in my third year. But I wanted to ask you if I had to take a year off, would it be worth taking Step 1 since by then it would be a pass/fail exam? And if I did not take Step I and significantly improved on Step 2 and COMLEX 2, what would my chances be for matching into DR after 4th year? What are other things that I can do to optimize my chances of matching right away or, if not, matching after taking a year off?
Best

Answer:

For most programs, the COMLEX exam holds much less weight than the USMLE. If you score well on the USMLE and don’t score so well on the COMLEX, it does not matter as much. That said, if you decide to take the new pass/fail USMLE Step I, the scores for the USMLE Step II become much more important, especially coming from a DO school. So, it will become a much more critical exam to do well on. I would go as far as to say that a good USMLE Step II score will become a requirement for you to get in since programs will most likely use this score as a screening criterion for interviews. (in the past, you only needed Step I.)

Taking a year off to take an exam is a red flag from a program director’s perspective. Why? Because it shows that you may not be able to multitask well. And, radiology residencies involve lots of multitasking. So, if you are taking off an entire year to take exams, it raises lots of questions from a program director’s view. If you decide to take that route, you need to do something else that will add to your CV for getting into a radiology program, such as a relevant radiology research year/fellowship. Taking off a year just to retake the exams would be a disaster for your application.

My two cents,
Barry Julius, MD

 

 

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Thinking About Owning An Imaging Center? Tread Carefully!

owning an imaging center

Question About Owning An Imaging Center

 

Hi Barry, I received a call from a group of radiologists looking to sell an imaging center. We are a primary care group of 20 PCP’s. Can you direct me to resources to better understand the current pros and cons of owning an imaging center?

Thanks, 

Opportunity Knocks

 

 

Answer:

That is an excellent question!

Although I don’t own an imaging center myself, I can tell you some of the general pros and cons of owning one, having worked in many during my working lifetime.

Owning an imaging center is essentially like owning a second business. You will be responsible for a large team of employees. And, you will be critical to managing the property itself, whether it’s rented or owned. Moreover, you will collect the full payments from insurance companies, Medicare, Medicaid, and self-payers. Unfortunately, the reimbursements for current procedures continually drop over time, so you have to expect to provide some wiggle room when you purchase buildings and equipment. Be very careful not to overspend.

Furthermore, you need to run an efficient team or know how to find someone to run an efficient team. If not, your competitors down the street will run you out of business. It is not good enough to want to run an imaging center. Instead, you need to know the intricacies of how to run an imaging center. It is never has been and never will be a sure thing. (As many physicians think before owning one!)

And it isn’t straightforward. These skills include knowing how to negotiate with insurance companies, understanding how to get patients on and off the table quickly, when to provide new procedures/modalities, how to get your radiologists to work efficiently, and what furniture offers the best outcomes for patients. Therefore, your team needs to be extremely knowledgeable and experienced. Don’t just go into the process, thinking that you know what you need to do! Most importantly, why do you think you can run a better center than the radiologists that came before you?

That said, there is a reward if you can manage the most efficient/well-run practice in town. If not, I would stay out of the imaging centers’ business because it is very competitive, and the margins are tight.

If you want to find out more about running an imaging center, you can go to the ACR website, and they will provide you information and courses on how to run a practice. While you are there, check out the Radiology Leadership Institute, where they have entire classes on this subject. You might want to consider that as well.

 

Hope that helps,

Barry Julius, MD

 

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Is Radiology Still A Lifestyle Specialty?

lifestyle specialty

Many of you have probably heard about the classic acronym for choosing a lifestyle specialty called ROAD: Radiology, Ophthalmology, Anesthesiology, and Dermatology. But does radiology still belong in this acronym? Or should we entirely discard this as an ancient historical quirk? (Those days fifty years ago when we only used X-ray, nuclear medicine, and ultrasound!) So, let’s look at the criteria that should make up a lifestyle specialty, including the amount of time that you need to work, the amount of money that you can make, the amount of stress in your daily work life, and the flexibility of living and working where you want when you want. Then, let’s go through whether we, as radiology specialists, can still meet the criteria for a lifestyle specialty and compare it to others. And finally, let’s give the radiology specialty a final grade.

Grading Criterion For Radiology As A Lifestyle Specialty

Hours

This first criterion is a bit hard to pin down. Why? Because it all depends on how much time you want to put into your career. I know folks who want to care for their children, work three or four days a week, and never take a weekend call. (Of course, you pay for that!) Then, others want to spend lots of extra time to be the breadwinner for the family. But, if you take the average radiologist and the average week, most are on the job more than they would like to admit. We can have long days that can easily breach ten or eleven hours if the work becomes busy. Yet, not all days are like that. So, the average radiologist works a nine-hour shift five days a week.

However, we have a little more vacation than most other specialties. And part of that is a historical quirk. Back in the day, around the beginning of the twentieth century, many radiologists became sick from radiation sickness’s harmful effects. Therefore, they tended to have more vacation time to compensate. Flash forward to today, and you will still find radiologists with a bit more vacation than most (even though our jobs do not expose radiologists to as much radiation). 

Unfortunately, that time may not be during the holidays and summer weeks because hospitals need our services twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. And some poor radiologist needs to cover! To average it all out, if I had to give a grade to this criteria, I would call it a B-. The extra vacation would boost our report card as opposed to other specialties. But, I am dinging us for the constant need for radiologists to work. If you had to compare our hours to other medical areas, others would work shorter and easier days with less vacation time. So, I certainly could not give us an A. But, yet we don’t have constant patient care like some internal medicine and surgical docs. B- minus seems reasonable to me!

Money

Money is a much easier criterion to define because we can base that number on a per-hour basis. And we can always harken back to our favorite medical specialty salary survey at Medscape. It’s a quick and dirty way to compare the average specialist’s salary for most medical specialties. The 2020 Medscape survey quoted the average radiology salary as the fifth most highly paid specialty out of twenty-nine at 427,000 dollars annually. So, that is in the top 20th percentile. For that reason, I can easily substantiate the grade of an A-. We are certainly not paid as much as the majority of Orthopedics and Neurosurgeons. But, indeed, we are nowhere near the salary of most pediatricians!

Stress

Ahh. This criterion is also highly variable, depending on your subspecialty. Some folks are purely outpatient and work in very cush environments or at home. And other folks are bombarded continuously with ER cases and stat procedures like neuro-interventionalists. However, as a whole, we typically don’t have to perseverate on phones with insurance companies like other subspecialties (I consider that one of the most significant stressors!) Yet, all of us are getting tons of phone calls. Moreover, we can enact actual harm to patients because what we say matters significantly to patient care, including life and death (a cause for aggravation and lawsuits!).

So, let’s compare it to other specialties. Dermatologists don’t have as many life-and-death decisions. Yet, ob/gynecologists, surgeons, and internal medicine docs have much more aggravations with insurance companies and uncompliant patients. So, I will give our specialty a B-, a standard average grade.

Flexibility

Now, if I had to pick one area where we excel, it is flexibility. We can live where we want, work when we want, be academic or private, and see patients or not see patients as we wish. I can’t think of any other specialties with our far-reaching flexibility for types of work as a radiologist. We can live and work in the country or the city. You can work on the weekends only or during the nights or days. Or, we can rarely see a patient again (especially as a teleradiologist!)

In this department, we beat out pretty much all the specialties. Not one even comes close to radiology when it comes to flexibility! I would have to give this criterion an A+.

Is Radiology A Lifestyle Specialty: The Final Conclusion

So, let’s give all our grades a weighted average and pretend we are still in college. Here is a post with the conversion info!

Hours: B- or 2.7

Money: A- or 3.7

Stress: B- or 2.7

Flexibility: A+ or 4.0

Drum roll, please. If you average out our grades based on these criteria, you get a final grade of 3.275, just a little shy of a B+. But let’s call it a B+, for argument’s sake. Do you think that still makes a lifestyle specialty? I think so. But, perhaps, not as much as you might have thought at first! It’s not an A!

Want to learn more about the specialty of radiology and the training involved? Check out my book on Amazon. And click on the link below. (I am an affiliate of Amazon as well!)