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Like other doctors, emergency room physicians get about 25 to 35 days of paid time off (PTO) each year. Taking this time off helps doctors alleviate stress and improve their work-life balance. Ultimately, taking time away from the ER helps them provide better care for their patients and avoid mistakes – which is beneficial to both patients and hospitals.
Unfortunately, ER physicians don’t always take all their vacation time each year. In 2024, Medscape surveyed 1,162 physicians to get a better understanding of PTO use by doctors. Nearly a third (30.8%) of ER physicians who responded said they had taken 5 or fewer paid days off within the previous year. More than 76% of ER doctors reported taking less than three weeks of PTO per year, compared with nearly 60% of doctors from all specialties.
What’s more, some emergency physicians aren’t completely off the clock when they are on vacation. Historically, emergency medicine has been touted as having a ‘controllable lifestyle,’ in which physicians were done with work the moment they stepped through the sliding glass doors. Today’s ER docs may stay on the clock even after they take off their lab coats. Some take on shifts at alternative care clinics or telemedicine portals to provide care in underserved areas. The use of telemedicine for emergency medicine is on the rise, especially in rural areas, in which the number of ER patients has skyrocketed 60% in the past decade, while the number of hospitals and doctors has plummeted by up to 15 percent.
The reasons ER doctors don’t take their vacation time are not exactly clear. Most ER physicians who participated in the survey said that their choice to skip vacation time wasn’t shaped by lack of coverage, the financial costs of taking time off, or the potential for heavy workloads when they returned.
It is possible that these clinicians were reluctant to take a break because they often have to “pay back” the time by working extra shifts before and after their PTO.
Exceptional ER physician scheduling systems can help emergency physicians get the shifts they want at their local ER, and on the days and times that they find the most convenient to accommodate off-site work.
Emergency medicine scheduling helps doctors map out their time off so that they can truly rest and rejuvenate. These shift scheduling systems allow clinicians to request time off, pick up extra shifts, and swap shifts to accommodate vacation time.
Using the Right ER Physician Scheduling Can Help Doctors Go on Vacation
Sometimes doctors are slow to take vacation time because antiquated scheduling systems make it hard to schedule meaningful blocks of time. Using the right ER physician scheduling system makes it easier to schedule time off or to switch shifts without filling out endless forms. For example, ByteBloc’s “Swap Meet” allows providers to list available shifts that others can pick up, trade, or split. ByteBloc even makes it easy to manage sick calls for adjustments and payroll purposes.
For more information, contact ByteBloc today!
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