u/Local-Butterfly9669

Doing a weekend trip for a friend’s event next month in North Aurora. I lived in DC for over a decade and have been to Chicago multiple times, so I’m very familiar with the city itself and comfortable using public transit. On previous trips though, I mostly stayed in Chicago proper and relied on CTA/Metra, so I don’t know much about the suburbs/outskirts.

I’m staying in my usual hotel in River North because I still want to spend most of my time in the city. Looking at GPS, North Aurora seems about 45-50 minutes out depending on traffic. I’m only going to this event for maybe 8-10 hours max.

I’ll also be traveling with my 50-year-old mother this time. She’s fully mobile and independent, but she does have some neurological issues and can get overwhelmed if there are too many transfers/steps/chaotic situations. We do fine navigating DC Metro and using Uber when needed, so I think we’ll be fine getting around downtown Chicago with transit like usual. For the event though, I’m willing to spend a little extra money or time if there’s a much simpler/more direct option.

My first thought was to use CTA/Metra normally while in the city and rent a car just for the day of the event, then return it that evening or the next morning.

I’m assuming Uber/Lyft that far each way could get expensive and would definitely limit us being able to get around if the event lasts long or shifts locations as parties sometimes do, and public transit looks doable but inefficient once you get past Aurora itself.

Does renting a car for that one day sound like the smartest move, or is there a better option locals would recommend? Open to Metra + Uber combos too if that’s the better move.

Noob question I’m sure, but just wanna make sure I’m understanding this correctly.

My job gives us a free UpToDate subscription, and from what I understand the searches/reading count as Category 1 CME. Of course, NCCPA says I need 50 Cat 1 CME + 50 additional CME hours over the 2-year cycle.

I’ve been stressing trying to find conferences/courses/subscriptions that fit within my job’s CME budget without eventually coming out of pocket. But am I correct that I could technically fulfill the whole requirement just through UpToDate credits?

I work in a high-acuity/high learning-curve environment and already have 30ish credits in a few months just from using UTD at work. Realistically I’ll probably hit 60–70 by the end of the year, maybe even the full 100 by the end of the cycle.

Just making sure I’m not misunderstanding this before I stop hunting for extra CME stuff lol.

New grad here looking for documentation efficiency tips/dot phrases before I lose my mind lol. I’ve been at my ICU job about 10 weeks now. I work 7 12s in a row, so by sign out I am VERY ready to go home, but I keep finding myself staying late at least 2-3 times a week finishing notes.

I don’t usually even necessarily mind documenting, but lately, it has become my 2nd least favorite part of the job. (The first being the nonstop exposure to whatever bacteria/virus/prion/disease process the universe decides to spawn that day and the non-zero chance you walk into work & end up treating patient zero for whatever that thing might be.)

Anyway… ICU documentation feels brutal because every patient has like 10+ truly active problems and everybody is so sick that I end up being overly detailed. And it was nailed into my head to be THOROUGH and document EVERYTHING because you can’t prove what you did in a courtroom a decade from now if you never wrote it down. Which I think is good advice to a degree especially as a rookie still getting my feet wet, but my notes are sometimes insanely long. I genuinely hate imagining the poor soul reading them after me.

A lot of it is because I work so many days in a row so I’m usually following the same person for the entire week, so I write notes almost like reminders to my future self so I remember what to follow up on, trends, pending studies, consultant recommendations, etc.

I know I’m not magically gonna become one of those seasoned people who somehow finishes all their notes before breakfast, but there HAS to be a better system than this.

Does anybody have:
- good ICU dot phrases/templates?
- a repository of useful smart phrases?
- formatting tricks?
- ways to document thoroughly without writing a novel?
- tips for separating “important for billing/medical record” vs “important for my brain”?

Would appreciate literally anything that made your workflow faster as a new grad.

LONG POST ALERT.

New grad PA here, about 6 months in, 26F, and I can’t shake this feeling that I might have stopped short. I know the advice for under 30/40 is “you’re young, just do it” but I have a lot to consider as far as what I want my life to look like as well.

Not trying to be dramatic, but ever since clinical year I kept thinking “I could’ve done that” watching the residents and attendings. Not in a cocky way, just in the sense that I didn’t feel out of my depth (with additional training of course). I don’t even know if I could’ve or would’ve gotten into med school but I did get into 9 of the 12 PA schools I applied to.

For context, I grew up pretty poor in the deep South, and I am a single woman and take care of everything alone so after graduating HS, getting stability and making money quickly were big factors in choosing my undergrad degree & eventually PA school. The need for a decent income & stable life was urgent. And coming from my background, I am genuinely grateful for this opportunity. I like my job, I respect the role immensely, I’m supported, and the money is solid. I make almost triple what my mom made my entire childhood, so I don’t take that lightly . I acknowledge that I went from making $10 an hour to being in the top quintile of earners. I’m extremely grateful. I can’t express that enough.

Right now, I’m working in a high acuity setting and so I am still in that new grad phase where I’m lowkey scared all the time but managing and starting to get the hang of things. But as I learn more, I can already see the ceiling, and that’s what’s bothering me. I’ve also had several physicians ask me why I didn’t go to medical school and tell me I should have. I think I’m in denial because my response is always the parroted “too long, too much debt, etc”

In all honesty, I have almost 200k debt. I don’t imagine med school would’ve been THAT much more. Now I keep wondering if I chose the quicker path when I should have just stuck it out.

Tim matters too. At 18, when choosing a career path, I was like 12 more years of school? NO WAY. Now at 26, 30+ doesn’t seem so old/far away after all. If I had gone the MD route from the jump, I’d either be finishing med school or well into it by now.

I did 28 months of PA school, so part of me is like, what’s another year and a half? Except it’s not a year and a half anymore, it’s completely starting over. I feel like I have wasted time and money.

And having seen what residents do honestly, residency doesn’t seem as terrible as I once thought. The hours suck, but it’s still just a job. And after all, it’s temporary. My best friend is in med school right now and going through it, but there’s a very clear end goal and the opportunities after seem wide open.

At the same time, there are real things holding me back:
- Like I already said, I have about $180k in PA school loans and I’m planning on PSLF but still, Med school would easily double or triple that.
- I’m planning to start a family within the next 2 to 3 years. Not in the traditional sense but I am planning to go the SMBC route, which severely complicates my decision making. To note, This is one of my most important goals/priorities in the next few years.
- I’d need more prereqs and probably a post-bacc or SMP, so at least 1 to 2 more years before I can even apply, which would cause me to either go part time or need to stop working altogether. During schooling (if I got in), I could probably work a day or two each month, but I can’t bank on that. As a single income household, this matters.
- I have a lot of travel planned in the next couple of years.
- I was miserable in PA school and swore I’d never go back to school for any reason
- I finally have stability and can breathe, which I didn’t experience growing up

I also can’t ignore the long-term thought of being 50 or 60 and still taking orders from people who, as of today, aren’t even born yet.

If I’m being honest, I used to talk a lot in the MD vs APP debates, and now I’m questioning whether I was just convincing myself.

I’m not aiming for anything ultra competitive, probably IM or EM. I’d love a little 7 on/7 off role as a hospitalist at a little country hospital or manning an urgent care. This isn’t about prestige. It’s more about autonomy and not feeling capped long term.

I don’t want to make a rushed decision this early, but I also don’t want to ignore this and regret it later.

Someone talk me through this, Be real with me.