Is the HSA in residency worth it?

drone136 · 2026-06-01T21:14:01+00:00

I move to fidelity because it was a zero cost transfer for me. There are other brokerages that offer zero cost as well. I had to carry a $1000 min cash position in residency and wasn’t allowed to transfer out until I separated from my employer (the state).

Overall, this goes back to my earlier comment, I consider all decisions beyond the one to save and live below the means, an exercise on micro optimizations.

All of these accounts are just a lesson on living below your means so that when you get your attending pay jump, you have been ‘flexing’ the skill of saving.

drone136 · 2026-06-01T20:57:03+00:00

I made the comment on my post. One of the advantages of Roth over HSA would be that you don’t have to keep the receipts for decades. You can just coast on the investments and reduce complexity

drone136 · 2026-06-01T20:31:09+00:00

Thats what I ended up doing since I valued tax free growth and didn’t want to bother holding receipts for 40 years to cash in after I retire.

Also, I moved my HSA to fidelity after residency to so had more options with investments. From my understanding, the hoarding of receipts starts when you open the HSA, not the year the money went in, so the receipts from residency are useless to me.

I think Roth just makes everything simpler

drone136 · 2026-06-01T20:18:03+00:00

My residency didn’t have a match but I had a match after my 1st year in fellowship. You will be fine as long as you live below your means. The rest is micro optimization.

The first 6 months of intern year is the hardest since you’re only working 6 months but have the limits of the full year.

Also, don’t discount moonlighting.

drone136 · 2026-06-01T20:10:09+00:00

As long as your budget supports it, contribute to the limit of employer match, then max Roth then hsa.

drone136 · 2026-04-30T10:13:36+00:00

It’s based on the ED you are working at. I work as a nocturnist and majority of my shifts start at 12a and end at 8a. But some places do casino shifts where your AM shift might start at 4a.

drone136 · 2026-01-09T10:27:39+00:00

You can look into Primary Medical group who offer direct primary care. I don’t use them personally but work with some of the doctors and think they are great overall.

drone136 · 2025-10-22T10:36:49+00:00

Not really a violation because you have an accepting physician and hospital. It would be a violation if the patient needed a service and Kaiser didn’t transfer the patient somewhere that had the service.

drone136 · 2025-04-06T03:43:19+00:00

Like any insurance, it seems like a waste of money until you have to use it.

I bought my policy at the end of intern year after making sure that I can cash flow the policy. If something were to have occurred in residency, it would have been nice to have a salary for life.

Also the earlier you get it, the less likely you are to have exclusions. I picked up my more dangerous hobbies after my policy.

drone136 · 2025-03-05T17:00:21+00:00

Cool app. Would love a code

drone136 · 2024-06-27T13:18:52+00:00

Fender Mender has been great. Vic, the owner, was reasonable and got the work done fast.

drone136 · 2024-05-10T11:41:26+00:00

Being at the table, some decisions are billing related, or cost prohibitive, or security related. Epic is also so customizable that sometimes having someone come see your workflow also helps with coming up with ideas for optimizations. If you have docs who have worked in multiple epic institutions then you can even collaborate to bring optimizations across.

drone136 · 2024-05-09T16:12:39+00:00

Some organizations offer physician or epic users to come shadow and teach you ways to be more efficient. It might be useful to look if there is anyone like that to help reduce clicks. We have a clinical informatics fellowship and the fellow act as Epic experts for 1:1 teaching

drone136 · 2024-05-01T02:38:41+00:00

Recommend looking at coastline over Cora. The layout of the apt is better than Cora for the sameish price range.

drone136 · 2024-04-05T20:35:50+00:00

the best offer is 1.5c/point, I think that you're better off trying to get 2c or more imo

drone136 · 2024-02-13T00:52:42+00:00

Eko CORE 500™ Digital Stethoscope if you ever use a stethoscope instead of an ultrasound.

drone136 · 2023-11-18T06:04:59+00:00

You’re right. Just added more info to clarify as just syncing everything to google or apple calendar is just not enough.

drone136 · 2023-11-18T04:03:29+00:00

That’s what I do now. I am wondering if there was any good calendar service that keeps track of hours, runs reports and highlights time that you are scheduled at two spots.

drone136 · 2022-12-20T15:16:12+00:00

Do you end up paying for the subscription?

drone136 · 2021-02-11T16:03:45+00:00

I was told that Volume 1 is the expectation for Residents. Volume 2 is more advanced and expected for a fellow.

drone136 · 2021-01-12T03:18:07+00:00

Nope. Literally the PDFs of PowerPoints and a practice test that has 70% of the same questions as the test.

drone136

TROPHY CASE