Connection: Interns Here For Training

Medical interns and residents who train in Spokane are closely supervised to make sure they aren’t worked to exhaustion, local hospitals say.

“We’re not in this to get work from them,” says Debora Davis, residency training program coordinator at Deaconess Medical Center. “We’re here to train them.”

About 80 interns and residents participate in training in Spokane each year, in specialities ranging from internal medicine to radiology and psychiatry. When they are on call, they report for work at Deaconess Medical Center by 7 a.m., work through the day, and stay at the hospital at night in an “on call” status.

There are sleeping facilities for the doctors at the hospital, Davis said, to allow them to catch as much rest as possible during the evening “on-call” hours.

They are back on-duty at 7 the next morning and work until 1 p.m. During that time, they are briefing the next on-call doctor on the patients in their care.

The doctors-in-training are only allowed to work such “on-call” around-the-clock shifts once every four nights. The average is closer to once every five or six nights, Davis said.

Overall, the interns and residents aren’t allowed to work more than 80 hours a week.

The Council of Graduate Medical Education, which accredits such training programs, enforces the standards, Davis said. And Deaconess has never been cited for running its students too hard.

The physicians overseeing the training also are cognizant of the stress on their students. “They have all been there too,” Davis said.

“They know how important it is” to make sure the interns and residents get ample rest.