I would like to meet someone who has gone through med school while they had kids. I have a ton of questions in so many areas of where halacha, children and med school meet. My kids are going to be 3, 5, and 6 when I plan to start med school (fall of 2008). I know I am going to med school, nothing is going to change my mind, i just want some advice from an experienced person on how to handle it.

Thanks

Hi!
I'd be happy to chat with you. I'm frum and had my first child in my first year of med school.

Feel free to PM me and we can arrange a time to speak.

Ksiva Vchasima Tova

Yeah, glad to hear of another frum mom in medicine! I, too, had a child before starting med school. I wasn't frum then but I am now (I'm going through my second internship now) with a 13 year old, a 21 month old and G-d willing, one due in January!

L'shana tova.
Kate (Yael Tamar)

Could I join in?

We've got 2 beautiful kids, B"H, ages 4 and 22 mos, I'm in PGY2, and my husband is a resident too. There are 3 or 4 other frum "grown-up" female MDs in my area , but as some of them will be my colleagues I don't choose to confide in them :-)


B'sha tova Tamar and IUSBxx

To IUSB - if you're wondering how to handle Shabbos - I strongly suggest planning on a Shomer Shabbos residency, official or not. It has kept our family together, although our house a mess. When I started med school, I planned to work with heterim on Shabbos, since I was pursuing training to save a life, etc. My husband matched one year ahead of me, and I learned so much by his example of setting his mind to Shomer Shabbos even for residency training! We both matched in the same town as our medical school, so we hob-nobbed with our prospective departments, and then during or befor official interviews, asked how they'd manage a Sabbath-friendly schedule. We both , and other physicians in town, have so many stories of HaShem making things happen to ensure Shabbos. Surprisingly early OR days, understanding attendings during winter months...

There is PGY1-2 couple I know who worked out not to ever be on call together for child care purposes , but had to forgo a shomer shabbos request. I envied them at first - but I am so thankful for the Shabbos our family has together.

Anyhow -- please, mentors or questioners, write back!

I hope you don't mind me jumping in too.

Briefly, I'm doing prePA/premed studies right now. I haven't decided which path yet- long story (kids, husband's job etc)

I'm looking for some advice as I prepare to get health care experience.

How do you deal with tznius and haircovering in a clinical setting?
Just doing CPR training in a skirt and a longish sheitel was funny- as you can well imagine.
Does anyone have any practical suggestions?
Feel free to PM me for my email-
Thanks-
A

Hi, dbee and others!

Practical tznuit in training---

I got a shoulder-length synthetic sheitl that I washed weekly and dried on its "head" for a total of 10 minutes) - it looked good, I got a lot of compliments including "oh, what a great color, is it natural?" (imagine the poor young night nurse when in my astonishment I blurted out, "oh, it's a wig!")

My recurrent dream was that I'd have to share a call room as a med student and someone would come in and see my sheitl askew... I decided to sleep in a comfy knit hat, hide my sheitl under a towel, and tell people it keeps my hair in better shape!

Not many long straight skirts, but long stretchy or flowy skirts are fine -- many colleagues wear shorter straight skirts, but I couldn't do rounds in those anyhow!

For surgery rotations, I found dress-scrubs. One hospital had them in the locker room, mostly for the janitorail and support staff. . OB floors may have some available. You can order them / purchase them yourself on the web. One hospital I rotated did not have them, so I wore dress-scrubs of a different color, and I just told people, "This hospital doesn't have dress-scrubs, I only wear skirts, so I provided these on my own." No one cares.
In the OR, I had to wear scrub pants under my scrub dress. My elbows were exposed for the minutes between scrubbing in and gowning up.

For call / post-call -- I don't bother wearing scrubs. Patients think you look nicer, anyway, and you can decide whether to actually change clothes in the morning or not. If you're in an icky rotation, you could 1) wear scrub pants under your skirt ? 2) ask your rabbi 3) buy 4-10 cheap skirts you plan to throw away!

BTW, it's not uncommon to request same-sex sleeping quarters, even if not assigned. It's normal! For one rotation, I slept in the chief residents' office b/c they couldn't provide single sex call rooms.

As a resident, I have more control over where I sleep on call, and I don't have to wear scrubs!
I splurged on a nice human-hair sheitl to get me through psychiatry residency, since I'm not usually worried about bodily fluids ;-)

Thanks! I'll have to look for a sheitel that I can tuck behind my ears- I've yet to find a reasonably priced one that looks good 'up'.
Those were all good suggestions- I'll look into them.
Kol tuv-
A

I was a little more laid back in my approach. At first, I tried to find a shaitel I could sleep in, but as I'm really bad with hair I could never keep it looking normal. In med school I kept a shaitel head in my locker and changed to a hat for anatomy lab. On surgical rotations I found that 4 scrub head covers worn together was thick enough that my hair couldn't be seen. As a resident, I wore a snood. I would be fully dressed, with a shaitel during the day, then after sign-outs I'd change to a snood. When staff asked about it, I'd tell them that if everyone else could be in pajamas (aka scrubs), I could be comfortable, too. I actually got very few questions from patients but when I gave the above explanation and explained that I was religious, none of them had a problem with it and it did not seem to change my acceptance at all. For rotations where we were required to wear scrubs, I just wore a snood at all times.

As far as scrubs, I bought myself a few scrub dresses, let the hems down as far as possible, and bought matching material to lengthen the sleeves. No one ever said anything and I never had to wear pants underneath, although I know that in some hospitals that is required. My OB is frum and she wears scrub pants but keeps a cover up on at all times except when delivering or operating. You should ask a shaila as different rabonim will pasken differently.

I debated what to do about shaking hands with men. To a certain degree, it could be considered part of the treatment. If a patient is uncomfortable with you, it can affect his reaction to his treatment and his acceptance of it. After discussing it with my rov, I decided it really wasn't right to shake. My standard approach is to try to keep something in my right hand. If the patient puts out his hand, I just say "I'm Jewish, I don't shake". Most people just accept that and move on. If they give me a puzzled look, and I explain that in Judaism we keep men and women somewhat separated and only husbands and wives touch. That is usually enough explanation and the person will often apologize and move on. (although I've never understood why they feel a need to apologize for not knowing halacha...).

The hospital where I did my residency did not have separate call rooms for two rotations (L&D and NICU). A few of us made a stink and we were told to share with OB, make ours male and theirs female. This worked a few times, but for the most part I ended up sleeping in the nursery on 2 chairs shoved together. It was certainly less than ideal. However, like anything in life, you have to pick your battles and to me this one was just not worth it. When I was on the floors, I usually ended up sleeping in an empty patient's room, anyway, since the call rooms were far away and it wasn't worth wasting the time running back and forth.

I think the most important thing is to find a rov who knows medical halacha and develop a relationship with him. There are so many details in medicine that come up that you need to have someone who can understand what you are going through to be able to answer your questions. A rov who does not understand what residency is like may not understand why it is difficult not to shake hands, for example, or have thought about what to do if a Jewish patient dies and the family wants the body released to a non-jewish undertaker, etc.

Any more questions? feel free to PM me as well if you want. This could be a really interesting thread!

I am conservative and somewhat educated, though not at all frum. I am finding this thread fascinating. I have worked with students, colleagues, and patients who are frum and I always observe their behavior with interest. There really seems to be every degree of the spectrum with regard to all the details you are mentioning. I have seen a lot of variation.

Most frum colleagues are men, very few women. So things like attire are easier for them.

Interestingly, I have to say that I always assumed hand shaking was OK in a situation where you were going to be examining a patient and touching them anyway. Although if I personally have a male pt who is frum I don't shake hands, yet still examine him, figuring he'd appreciate that.

For the original poster, my best advice is to select a program where there is already a frum presence. I think it would be very hard have to negotiate all these details if no one has done it before you. There are definitely people who don't understand and therefore resent some of the Shabbat restrictions.

Interesting thread.

Also wanted to add that having a very observant person in the program affects other Jewish students/residents who are not frum. People start asking them a lot of questions about why they don't do the same things...

Dear ladies, my country of origin and the region of the US where I now live both have a very small Orthodox Jewish population. As a matter of fact, I can't remember seeing a single person in either that I could identify as Orthodox Jew. I didn't even know what frum meant until today, and I've looked for the meaning of several of the words you mentioned here without success.

Would anyone like to educate me about the social customs or laws? I'm terribly afraid of making a faux pas (like trying to shake a man's hand - I touch people a lot, it's a cultural thing). I've been looking on Wikipedia with little success. I always try to be sensitive to other cultures and religions but it's hard when I'm not educated about them. Thank you in advance!

Baby Einstein-- are you Jewish? If not, I don't think anyone (like patients) would expect anything out of the ordinary when interacting with you.

I like all these notes! I agree strongly with rydys, who suggests speaking and having relationship with a competent rav. Made easier for me some b/c my husband asked the non-female specific questions a year ahead of me -- but definitely important. Also, I wore my sheitl not so muhc out of professionalism, but, as it was still new to me, I hadn't let most folks in on the secret of hair-covering. I like the snood ideas; so many women of Islamic practice do wear head-coverings and they do just fine.

I like what I'm going to get to do (practice psychiatry and help people who need it!) -- but the hardest thing is that med school and resisdency almost NEEDS to take place during child-bearing and family-forming years. I wonder, if someone had caught me at 18 or 19 or 20, if I would have elected to puruse PA school instead... it's too late to look back, and I am so thankful for everything in my life.. but I do tend to steer young frum women to look at other medical careers (anesthesia assistants, scrub techs, LISW/counselors, child life, PAs, NPs if for general practice or even easy hospital rounding..)
Anyone else?

Baby Einstein, this is what I meant. Most religious Jews, especially those living outside of major Jewish centers, do not expect others to know the details of what we do and don't do and therefore do not take offense to something like shaking hands. If you were to offer to shake, he would probably just say something like "I don't shake" and move on. Most people also are not bothered by your asking why, as long as you are really curious. I've had my fair share of people come bck with nasty replies and trying to convince me that I'm backward and unenlightened for not wanting to shake--those responses are, to me, unenlightened.

The basic thing to remember when dealing with religious Jews is that we believe that our laws are given directly from the mouth of G-d, and will not bend them to suit our needs, no matter how inconvenient. On the other hand, not every issue is clearly written out in the Torah, and the Rabbi's are the ones who have the tools to understand how to apply the basic laws (there are 613!) to each situation. For example, it took years to determine whether we could use electricity on the Sabbath, as electricity is clearly not mentioned in the Torah. The Rabbis who worked on that went to the leading scientists of the day, learned physics, obtained a real understanding of what electricity is and how it works and used the tools from the Torah to determine that we cannot use it on Shabbos.

The same is true of medical situations. There are many Rabbis today who "specialize" in medical halacha (Jewish law). Some of these Rabbis could almost be doctors themselves! For example, my father's Rebbe, known as the "Bostoner Rebbe" bec. he lives in Boston, runs a large organization which assists people with medical referrals, hospitality when they come to Boston for procedures, and funding for those who can't afford to pay. After more than 60 years of doing this, he has a deep understanding of medicine and can discuss cases with leading physicians on nearly an equal status which allows him to determine where a new procedure fits in to Jewish Law.

My suggestion would be that when you run into a conflict with a patient where they don't seem to want to do what you think clearly needs to be done, ask them to get in touch with one of these Rabbis who can help them and you figure out what the law actually is and how it is applied in your case. To an Orthodox Jew, a Rabbi's ruling is as just as binding as G-d's written laws and he will then follow what the Rabbi says. On the other hand, if the Rabbi rules that he should do something different, you may have to be somewhat flexible bec. he will not go against the Rabbi.

Thanks, that was really helpful, especially this part:

"The basic thing to remember when dealing with religious Jews is that we believe that our laws are given directly from the mouth of G-d, and will not bend them to suit our needs, no matter how inconvenient."

Studying religions is just fascinating. Thanks again.

Hello all-

I know this thread is a bit old but I would like to thank you all for discussing these very important topics.

I also think you all (and anyone reading this thread) would be very interested to be a part of a new website that is geared toward helping Jewish women enter science and health related professions. The groups is called JAWS- or Jewish Alliance for Women in Science. The site features a forum, career descriptions, bloggers and a mentor program! It would be great to have you all contribute to the site!

Please visit us!

I didn't even remember this thread, but looking back it could have been really interesting. Any feedback from those who initially posted as to how they did in training, now that we are 4 years on?

Wow.. 4 years. That was right when I joined MomMD. Well, I'm still in training, but have gone part-time (80%), not enough flexible days but always off for Friday afternoons. As our calls became less intense and switched from over-night to ACGME-defined home call, there was less concern for me taking less Friday night call. I had slightly more Sundays than other folks did of Sat-Sun. Survived.
I'm up to deciding how to look for a job -- which in academics would include rounding on weekends-- if I skip the Saturday rounding, I'd make it up on Sundays... so how many Sunday mornings away is too many?

Still overall very grateful to our programs (my husband is physician too), very happy I knew the program director before I matched and that they knew me, grateful I'm doing well enough no one seems to begrudge the exceptions I need.