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PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   2018 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for April 5, 2026

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like surgeons are supposedly the jocks of the medical profession. The show Scrubs describes some of the stereotypes.

Yes just so.

Ortho, Pathology, and Internal Medicine are probably further apart in temperament and day to day work than a Lawyer, Tech-bro, and Finance-bro.

This makes us much harder to stereotype although there are definitely some (like being bad at finances).

What is the pathology stereotype, out of curiosity? One of my academic mentors had a side gig as a professor of pathology, wondering if he would fit.

Outside of specific subfields pathology is a pretty anti-social specialty with a lot of time working on their own/outside the hospital milieu and near zero patient interaction. Communication skills are therefore weaker. The work is also quite a bit more basic science oriented. When Glaucomflecken makes fun of pathologists they are unhealthily attached to their microscopes.

The other major anti-social specialty is Radiology, but Rads is up in everyone else's business and is required to know an incredible variety of shit. Sometimes get called the physician's physician because they know a lot and heavily guide decisions. Communication skills are a lot better because Rads gets called more often and reports are more nuanced and need clinical correlation and therefore shit like theory of mind. When Glaucomflecken makes fun of Radiologists it's about wearing sunglasses indoors (because they live in dark rooms with fancy computers).

When I went to the Path lab as a medical student they'd be happy to see me, apologize for things still being pending, offer to show me slides, and get me tea. When I went to find the imaging room I'd have to walk through a secret door in the back of a nursing locker room in the third sub-basement wherein I would get bitched at for exactly 30 seconds which was followed by exactly 30 seconds of clearly explaining the context behind the read. I would then flee.

The above is an exaggeration. ...And also not.

In my experience Pathologists make excellent pre-clinical teachers and mentors when inclined because they know and are interested in the more science stuff, and the ones who are involved have the patience and communication skills to be good teachers (otherwise they wouldn't do it). Radiologists make better clinical teachers and mentors because they have to be efficient/excellent at time management, and deal with a lot of risk and uncertainty.

Lastly, my friends in Radiology can still be trusted to know and remember basic clinical medicine shit. The pathologists...no.

Interesting. I would say that kind of tracks, someone who only socializes on his own terms. He was a great fellow and an excellent teacher in my field (when not working at the med school/research lab, he taught modernist/postmodern literature, with some divinity school courses on Aquinas, as well as adult education teaching God knows what). I saw his Google Calendar once and there must have been maybe ten events for the week in it, one of which was our meeting.

These days an intellectual life outside of medicine has been mostly beaten out of the field, so anyone who does that sort of thing is usually exceptional in some way (often in peculiarity and surplus of intellectual horsepower.

This makes me curious where your temperament lines up with the stereotype of your subfield.

Thankfully I'm a tremendously non-central example otherwise I couldn't write here. I'm sure someone who knew me very well in person would peg me immediately, which is a risk - in terms of more general opsec and guessing my specialty... my combination of rambling detailed knowledge and pontificating bullshit doesn't really meld with the periodic grumpy cursing incisiveness.

Those are pretty firmly going in two different directions stereotype wise.

I supposed I best fit the stereotype of an old-style PCP but they are pretty much dying out at this point.

I supposed I best fit the stereotype of an old-style PCP

Fooled me; I always figured that you were a crusty old GP!

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