Being a medical resident is bad job. 80-hour workweeks, single shifts that can stretch to almost a full day, low-pay that can force second jobs or moonlighting on shifts, and intense sleep deprivation are the norm. It's sometimes justified as a type of hazing, or immersion education, but is in fact a way for hospitals to extract extremely low wage labor and make the most of it. For the resident, it's a bad gig. But being the patient of a medical resident is arguably worse. A tired doctor makes mistakes. And mistakes can kill you. Which is why I have so little patience for the caterwauling around new rules meant to impose some minimal regulations on how hard residents work. How minimal? 16-hour workdays. And the next one can start after a five hour nap period. Of course, this is merely an Institute of Medicine report making these recommendations, and thus it's not binding, and won't be enforced. And so patients will die, and medical malpractice premiums will rise, and doctors will complain, and all so we can keep this bizarre program that understands apprenticeship as a mixture of masochism and cost-cutting.
