Session 67 Dr. Elaine Reno is an academic Emergency Medicine physician in Denver. She talks about why she choose academics, her work-life balance and more. First off, check out all our other podcasts on MedEd Media. If you're a premed student, be sure to take a listen to The Premed Years podcast, covering test prep, applications, essay writing and personal statement writing, interview prep and so much more. And if you have a suggestion for a guest here on the podcast, kindly shoot me an email at ryan@medicalschoolhq.net. Back to today's guest, Elaine has a subspecialty in Wilderness Medicine, which is really not that big of a practice. Rather, today we focus on academic emergency medicine and why Elaine chose this. Back in Session 2, we covered emergency medicine from a community perspective. In that podcast, we had Dr. Freess talking about community-based emergency medicine. This week, Elaine talks about being an academic emergency medicine, why she chose it, and much more. [02:10] An Interest in Emergency Medicine As a medical student, she did all the rotations but two things drew her which were Emergency Medicine and OB/GYN. She thinks they're both pretty similar being 90% routine and 10% acute crisis. Until she realized she likes the variety of Emergency Medicine. She also didn't like the operating room very much. If you think Emergency Medicine is all about gunshot wounds and adrenalin rush, Elaine says that most chest pains are not heart attacks or that in most car accidents, the people are fine. Or that most weakness or tingling sensation is not a stroke. "A lot of my day is much more routine than what most people think." [04:05] Traits that Make a Good Emergency Medicine Doctor Elaine explains that you're always going to need help, you're always going to need to talk to your specialty consultants. So you have to be a good communicator, and you have to be able to work with your specialty consultants. That being said, Elaine says how Emergency Medicine is like a team game where you have to be able to work in a team, with physicians, nurses, etc. "Emergency medicine is like an extreme team sport I think honestly more than any other medical specialty. You have to be able to work in a team." [06:00] Types of Patients and Typical Week They see anything and everything on a day to day basis. The common things they see are flu, respiratory illness, chest pain, abdominal pain, headaches - the bread and butter of emergency medicine. People come in with symptoms rather than diseases and it's your job to figure out what's going on and what you need to do to manage it. A typical week for them basically varies and she likes the variety of it even if other people hate that. Every week, her schedule is different and she likes it a lot. As an ER doctor, she mans the doors of the emergency room so she deals with everything that rolls in whatever it is during her shift. They do an extreme variety of cases everyday from chest pains coming from heart attacks and strokes from trauma patients, to cancer patients with infections or miscarriages or broken bones. [08:05] Academic vs. Community-Based or Private Practice What she likes about the Academics is primarily the teaching aspect of it. She likes working with the residents and teaching class for undergrad students. She likes teaching the course. She also describes the residents as very smart and if you can't keep up with them, you'd be on your toes. Nevertheless, she likes the learning and education that come with academics. "I just like the academic flavor, there's constant ongoing learning every single day. I feel like it challenges me everyday to learn more and to be a better doctor." [09:20] Is Emergency Medicine a Good Fit for You? Elaine explains that they do a lot of procedures. They're not surgeons but more of like intensivists in the level of procedures they do. Although gastroenterologists and cardiologists  do more procedures than them. Family medicine doctors do less. But they