ALL coverage and trade arrangement MUST be discussed and MUTUALLY AGREED UPON BY BOTH RESIDENTS before any forms/requests are submitted.
Please read the PTO policy carefully before arranging any coverage.
Rules and Guidelines for Trades/Swaps
Rules and Guidelines for Trades/Swaps
The following rules dictate if trades and swaps will be approved. While we will consider all trades, the proposals that adhere best to the policies below have the highest chance of being approved. Finally, the rules below are not guarantees that all requests will be approved. Extenuating circumstances in the schedule may occur which could prohibit some trades.
Does the trade you propose break any ACGME or program requirements?
- All R2s must have at least 1 ICU month.
- All R2s and R3s must have at least 1 month of wards per year.
- All residents should spend a minimum of two inpatient months at the VA during their residency. While this is sometimes not possible, we won’t approve any trades that put a resident at risk of going below the two months.
- Per ACGME graduation requirements, all residents must have subspecialty experiences, and trades that reduce a residents experience in a subspecialty field to <7 days will not be approved.
- Maximum critical care time over the course of residency is 26 weeks. ACS is 50% critical care, CCU is 12.5% critical care, and CPICU or MICU is 100% critical care. To avoid ACGME sanctions, we will not be able to approve any trades that compromise critical care caps.
- Every resident should have 4 weeks of elective and 4 weeks of vacation per year.
Does the trade you propose involve EROC or EIOC?
- If you trade a hybrid associated with an EROC/EIOC, the EROC/EIOC goes with the trade – these cannot be uncoupled.
- Trades that involve the entire week of EROC/EIOC, rather than individual days, have the highest chances of being approved. Very rare exceptions may be made under extenuating circumstances and depending on the availability of the EROC/EIOC pool.
Is the trade fair?
- In general, your trade should not result in another resident being unfairly burdened with call rotations.
- Even if you’re interested in pursuing a specialty, trades that result in you working an extraordinary amount of time on a subspecialty service (affecting your required training in other sub-specialties) will not be approved.
Does your request involve a request for coverage duration less than 7 days)?
- As with all trade requests, please find coverage for your trade before you submit the Coverage form.
- Read the "Guidelines for Advanced Coverage" tab above for how to find coverage before contacting your co-residents. As above, any swap that involves EROC of less than the entire week duration will rarely be approved.
- Some residents need coverage for events but haven’t arranged a reciprocal trade at the time they submit their coverage request. This is ok. Simply leave the “reciprocal coverage” form blank, and you may submit the request for reciprocal coverage at a later date. We will track these requests to ensure that all residents are paid back for their offers to cover their co-residents.
Does your request involve a request for coverage duration equal to or more than 7 days?
- Rotations must be traded in increments of 7 days (ie trades of, for example, 10 days duration won't be approved).
- Of note, call rotations trades of <2 weeks will not be approved due to issues with disjointed patient continuity and call schedules.
- Trade dates must coincide with natural rotation start/stop dates (typically Saturdays for inpatient, Mondays for outpatient).
Does your trade involve a clinic week?
- Trades between clinic weeks are generally NOT approved. There is very little room for flexibility in our +1 clinic schedule. Exceptions will be made only on a case-by-case basis (ie maternity/paternity leave, your own wedding).
- Exceptions are made during interview season, where we are generally able to approve coverage requests for up to two half days in the clinic. The more advanced notice we received, the higher chance we have of making this happen. Please notify IMSchedule as soon as you receive your interview dates.
- Please note that even if you trade out of your inbasket date, you are still required to complete your inbasket and your shared practice inbasket.
- Trades cannot increase the total number of residents staffing each clinic half day clinic to 10 (PRIME) or 12 (PCIM).
- Patients that are already scheduled should not be called to reschedule to a different day, even if that resident has another open slot on a different day they’re assigned to clinic.
- All effort should be made to avoid trades that interrupt the continuity of care of patients who are have already been scheduled with their PCP. Rare exceptions may be made in the event of interviews or other extenuating circumstances.
- Trades cannot result in a resident having any deviations from the assigned number of each particular half day from their clinic week. In a typical week, this means 5 clinic half days, 2 study half days, 1 inbasket, 1 population health, and Monday Didactics.
Does your trade involve a hybrid block that hasn’t yet been assigned?
- That’s ok! You may trade generic “hybrid” blocks as long as all of the criteria above are satisfied. The hybrid block will be assigned to a specific hybrid at a later date.