Medical residents have a tough life. It is supposed to give them the tools with which they will cure the sick during their professional careers. But, in the case of the 1,222 residents in programs offered by the Dominican Social Security Institute (IDSS) and the Armed Forces, the residents say that they are lacking too many basic tools. They arrive at the hospitals between 5:30 and 6:00 in the morning, relieve the night staff and begin rounds. After rounds they attend emergency patients and carry out research. All of this leads to 12-14 hour days and when they are on watch, they do it for 36 hours. Apart from this routine, there are bathrooms that do not work and a lack of food at the different hospitals. Some residents have to face violence or the threat of violence from patients or the family of patients when there is no medication available. The resident is a recent medical school graduate that has completed the one-year of “apprentice” service for the government and has been accepted into one of the many programs for medical specialties offered by the IDSS and the public health system in the public hospitals. Another problem facing the residents is that there are often many residents in one specialty and too few in another. The case of ear, nose and throat specialists, otorhinolaryngologists, for example, seems to be typical. According to Julio Cesar Castillo Vargas, head of teaching at the IDSS, there are cities without an otorhinolaryngologists or a neumologist. In reference to the latter, the founder of the IDSS residency programs told the El Caribe that they were very necessary in a country that is still fighting TB. Pedro Sing Urena, the head of the Ministry of Health’s residency programs, said that he felt that the economic crisis of the past few years has stripped the hospitals and they are without medicines or equipment and this demoralizes the residents.