Hospital Call

In-hospital call is a valuable experience in the professional development of resident physicians, and is one mechanism for placing the resident in a position of increased responsibility for patients. On-call duty in the hospital is one of the requirements of the ACGME for an accredited neurology residency. Our program was an early adopter of the night-float system, and there are no in-house 24 hour call shifts. There is a home call system at the VA and for pediatric neurology.

Supervised Call Shifts

Each PGY-2 resident will have a PGY-3 ‘buddy’ for their first call shifts while on the Consult Night Float rotation. During these shifts, new residents learn the hospital system, participate in stroke codes, and develop their consultation skills, so that they will be better prepared to take overnight calls later in the year.

Nightfloat

There are always at least two night-float residents at Yale New Haven Hospital, with three in-house night float residents assigned during the first part of the year. The Inpatient Night Float (INF) resident covers all inpatient Neurology services, sometimes including some Neuro-ICU patients, from 5:15 p.m. – 6 a.m. on weekdays, and from 8 p.m. – 7 a.m. on weekends. The Consult Night Float (CNF) resident(s) responds to all consults in the hospital, from 5:30 p.m. -7 a.m. on weekdays, and from 8 p.m. – 7 a.m. on weekends. Most night float rotations are done in two-week blocks, with one week as the INF resident and one week as the CNF resident.

PGY4

The PGY4 residents are not in-house overnight, but the chief-on-call is available from home to discuss consults and admissions with the night-float residents. They are expected to come to the hospital to assist the junior residents when the workload is heavy or when patients are seen whose care is difficult for the senior resident to supervise from home. All discharges from the ED, as well as all ICU admissions must also be discussed with the on-call attending.