New 24-hour rule for 1st-year residents will have multiple benefits according to Mayo doc

Residents used to be limited to 16-hour shifts.

Starting in July, first-year medical residents will now be able to work 24-hour shifts.

It’s a change from 16-hour shifts by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education.

Dr. Tom Grau of Mayo Health System said the old rules limited a young doctor’s experience, while this will have multiple benefits.

“Most all the team members have always had a 24-hour shift,” Grau said. “First-year residents stepped away from the team after 16 hours. It was just disruptive to the team. It impacted the cohesiveness of the team, the functioning of the team.”

He also said it would limit errors between those transitions.

“The shorter shifts you have, the more times you have to hand off patients to the next shift coming on,” Grau said. “That’s the time when mistakes can occur.”