Jarrod Shapiro, DPM Is Podiatry a Profession or a Job?
Your Survey Responses

A few weeks ago I proposed the question, Podiatric Medicine: A Profession or a Job? I posed this question as a result of a recent article relating an apparent decrease in the satisfaction rates of medical doctors in the United States. However, since podiatry remains the best kept secret in medicine, it’s not always possible to extrapolate the general medical profession to podiatry. As such, we posted a survey through podiatry.com and this ezine to see what you thought…

…and we received some very interesting responses.

First some quick stats for perspective. We had 250 total respondents to the survey. Given that there are 17,500+ licensed podiatrists¹ in the U.S., our small survey size is by no means representative of the entire profession. However, given what I know about the high intellectual level of the subscribers to PRESENT Podiatry, these are the smartest 246 podiatrists!

The number of respondents skewed toward greater years in practice with 75% being in practice 10 years or more.

When comparing the male versus female responses, 78% of responses came from men, and only 22% came from women. Given that more than 50% of medical students are women, with ever increasing numbers, the smaller proportion of female respondents here may be under-representational. Additionally, male responses included higher Extremely Satisfied and Very Dissatisfied responses...perhaps showing greater passion in their attitudes. Income potential trends were almost the same for both groups. Slightly more men would "do it all over again" than women (42% vs 32%).

Looking at the question, How satisfied are you with your current employment situation? the attitudes were more positive than one might think. Across the 250 responses, only 24% were Dissatisfied or Very Dissatisfied with their current employment situation. So 76% were Satisfied, with 46% being Very or Extremely Satisfied. That’s nice to see. Given the monetary and life commitment to becoming a podiatric physician, it’s hopeful to note a generally positive attitude.

In the responses to the question, Which of the following best describes your income potential? slightly more young podiatrists reported rising income than their older counterparts, and less young ones reported falling income, as you would expect. One important point to note here is that younger podiatrists – myself included – never experienced the "golden years" of medicine during the 1980s and 90s in which doctors made much more money per patient than we do today. This experience would clearly color one’s view on income potential.

Your Comments – Here’s What You Said

We asked two open ended Comment questions, and over 200 of you submitted answers – a great response. I am going to show you a few of the most representative responses below, but you may also follow this link to scan through ALL of the responses. They are actually quite interesting.

Stressors in Podiatric Practice

In response to the question, What is the biggest stressor that decreases your career satisfaction? the PRESENT folks created a "word scatter" display, showing the frequency that particular words were used in this open-ended fill in the blank questions. This question was really a gripe-fest, but when you ask for "Stressors" that's what you get.

"Stressors" question word scatter:

Prominent among the words used were Paper Work, Patients, Insurance, EMR, Charting and Government. Those are what you find to cause the most stress in your day to day practice.

Here’s what stresses you out - a representative sampling of your Comments on the Stressors question:

Insurance company's control over treatment protocols and fees
Very long hours
Government intrusion and meaningful use of computer work
Running and financing my private practice
Dealing with insurance companies
Getting new patients who can afford big deductibles under Obamacare
Too many patients and not enough providers — I work for the federal government at an Indian hospital
EMR, too much record keeping
Unrealistic patient expectations
Job security or lack of it
Not able to do what needs to be done for patients
Student loan debt
Noncompliant, ungrateful patients
Constantly changing healthcare law
Employees who don’t do their job

Comments – Is Podiatry a Job or a Profession?

The second open-ended comment question actually looked quite positive. In this question, you were asked for Comments on the issue of whether podiatry practice was a Profession or a Job.

Is Podiatry - a Job or a Profession? word scatter:

The most prominent words used here were GREAT Profession, Career, Job and Patients.

Here’s what you really think – a representative sampling of your Comments on the "a Job or a Profession" question:

Great profession — we help others like no one else can.
I am still in private practice, thus my practice is my profession. If I join a medical clinic, I would immediately consider my practice as a job.
Physicians are significantly overworked, underpaid, and under-appreciated along with being the ones blamed for the cost of health care.
Now it's a JOB!
I feel our professional associations, of which I belong to many of them, have failed us. I truly wish I had the very nearly $100,000 in dues I have paid them in my retirement account. Ditto for what I have put into PPAC. And this could have been a GREAT investment were it not handled so poorly over the years.
Podiatry is a Profession not a job as long as I continue to be in private practice.
I am frustrated by the number of patients that are not really interested in living healthy but wanting a quick easy fix. It is a profession though and not a job.
Great profession, marginal leadership, uncertain medical environment with Obamacare.
Our national society does nothing beneficial for us. the latest letdown....the diabetic shoe program.
I still love my job and my patients, but I may have to break down soon and join a group.
Still enjoy patient interaction, but has become much more of a hassle in last 10-15 years.
If conditions continue to evolve from their current state, I predict that physicians will lose their autonomy and will be employees of large corporations. Maybe that wouldn't be such a bad thing; I could concentrate on being a doctor rather than an office drone.
RNs and especially NPs have gained far more recognition in the health care delivery model than we have.
A single payer system would be favorable to reducing stressors mentioned above.
I spend more time with the computer and paper work than I do with patients.
Love the profession and love the interaction. Still enjoying it as much as when I started.
Podiatry is finally being merged into mainstream medicine ... We are finally being seen as physicians more and more.

Given the results of our small survey, we conclude that a majority of us feel podiatry is, in fact, a profession rather than a job, but it is an imperfect one. For this one podiatrist writing to you, I still feel podiatry is a profession/career, and not a job. My personal overall satisfaction is quite high, and when I compare my situation to others in the medical professions, I feel quite lucky to have the career I do. Remember, many of the complaints and "dissatisfiers" we came across in our survey are consistent across the medical professions. For what I have, the life I am able to lead as a result of being a podiatrist, I am very happy. Podiatry a profession and not a job? You bet.

Best wishes,

Jarrod Shapiro, DPM
PRESENT Practice Perfect Editor
[email protected]