Saturday, June 25, 2011

Specialty Stereotypes

“ All those things you fought against as a youth: you begin to realize they're stereotypes because they're true.”
-David Cronenberg

There are a lot of jokes among medical students and physicians about what types of people typically enter a given specialty.  Orthopedic surgeons are the clean-cut jocks.  Pediatricians are the nice people.  Psychiatrists are the quirky ones.  Internal medicine physicians are the intellectuals.  And what are emergency physicians?  We're the rebels, the people who don't quite conform to the standards of doctor-dom.

Of course, these stereotypes are just that: stereotypes, and they have limited relationship to reality.  But even limited relationships to reality are somewhat linked to reality.  This became apparent during the first half of our intern orientation this week, most of which we spent doing ACLS and PALS training.  On the first day of ACLS training, which was Tuesday, my classmates and I showed up in jeans, t-shirts, tennis shoes, and in one case, a pair of toe shoes.  What about everyone else?  The orthopedic surgery intern in my group wore a button-down shirt and khakis with loafers.  The medicine interns were dressed as if for clinic, with the men wearing shirts and ties with slacks, and the women in blouses with slacks or skirts.

I asked one of the medicine interns why he and his classmates were wearing ties.  He explained that they were told to dress professionally for clinic.  I pointed out to him that the mannequins were not going to think that he was unprofessional if he didn't wear a tie while performing CPR on them.  The next day, he and most of his classmates were not wearing ties, which was all for the best.  It isn't easy giving CPR to a mannequin when your tie keeps getting stuck between your hands and the mannequin's rubber chest.

The whole experience of giving CPR to mannequins is kind of strange anyway, especially when the mannequins are just a torso with no arms or legs.  At one of the ACLS stations, the preceptor asked my group what we wanted to do.  One of the other interns replied, "This guy has no arms, no legs, and no brain.  Are we sure that his life is worth saving???"

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