Law School or Medical School...

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Originally Posted by Law2Doc

I'm not buying it -- one career of necessity was taking a back seat, or this person did a lousy job in both. Having had a good taste of both professions, I can assure you that if you aren't devoting full time to one or the other field you are doing a crappy job and running a huge malpractice risk on a near daily basis. Honestly the amount of reading one ought to be doing to stay informed in either field is pretty significant. There are no shortcuts and no such thing as dabbling. Both fields are full time obligations or you aren't keeping up with the normal expectations. I would steer clear of these guys.

Is there any practicality to having both? Duke and a few other schools have combined JD/MD programs.

Originally Posted by 7175pank

Is there any practicality to having both? Duke and a few other schools have combined JD/MD programs.

Nope. You end up having to pick one, and there isn't really a great way to combine them that you couldn't do with just one or the other. There is no market for the combined degree, you don't get paid more, and employers aren't looking for the combo. The only reason anyone should have both is if they switch careers.

Originally Posted by Law2Doc

Nope. You end up having to pick one, and there isn't really a great way to combine them that you couldn't do with just one or the other. There is no market for the combined degree, you don't get paid more, and employers aren't looking for the combo. The only reason anyone should have both is if they switch careers.

That's good to know. It's hard for me to imagine someone who would want to do that but apparently they're out there.

Originally Posted by Law2Doc

I'm not buying it -- one career of necessity was taking a back seat, or this person did a lousy job in both. Having had a good taste of both professions, I can assure you that if you aren't devoting full time to one or the other field you are doing a crappy job and running a huge malpractice risk on a near daily basis. Honestly the amount of reading one ought to be doing to stay informed in either field is pretty significant. There are no shortcuts and no such thing as dabbling. Both fields are full time obligations or you aren't keeping up with the normal expectations. I would steer clear of these guys.

Can't speak to the guy's skill as an MD, but he was a decent lawyer. Most of the people I know who do both either are in emergency medicine (because the schedule is relatively more flexible, or so they tell me) or they do one on a seriously reduced level (like the guy who switched to law except for practicing one day a week in an urgent-care clinic).

Generally, I think I'd agree with you. But then, there are people who double-board and manage to keep up in both specialties, and I don't think it would be THAT much different to keep up with one medical specialty and a legal career. And I have yet to defend a malpractice case brought about by someone trying to practice law and medicine . I think anyone motivated (i.e. "crazy") enough to try and manage both is probably smart/conscientious enough to keep up with whatever needs to be done to do both competently, including not spending so much time on one that they can't keep up with the other. But the ones who actually try to do both are pretty rare--usually people switch from one to the other and stop doing whichever one they switched from.

Originally Posted by Law2Doc

Nope. You end up having to pick one, and there isn't really a great way to combine them that you couldn't do with just one or the other. There is no market for the combined degree, you don't get paid more, and employers aren't looking for the combo. The only reason anyone should have both is if they switch careers.

Yes. On that subject, I don't understand the surprisingly high number of MDs who go to the trouble of getting JDs for no really good reason (i.e. they never practice law) usually through some combined-degree program. It's a lot of extra time and money for not much added benefit. Sure, law schools like to claim that there are lots of good reasons to get a JD even if you don't practice law with it, and while they have a point, it's definitely not $120 - $160K worth of reasons. If you want to do policy/regulatory stuff, you can learn enough about that by doing it, without having to bother blowing hundreds of thousands of dollars and three (or more) years of your life on law school.

You certainly don't see lawyers getting MDs because they think it will help them be better malpractice or health-care lawyers. Most of us who do malpractice work can manage just fine without them--the doctors we represent, and whom we retain as experts, teach us everything we need to know to handle their case. The only reason I'm planning on getting a MD is because I want to practice medicine instead of law.

Originally Posted by SpaceLeftBlank

Can't speak to the guy's skill as an MD, but he was a decent lawyer. Most of the people I know who do both either are in emergency medicine (because the schedule is relatively more flexible, or so they tell me) or they do one on a seriously reduced level (like the guy who switched to law except for practicing one day a week in an urgent-care clinic).

Generally, I think I'd agree with you. But then, there are people who double-board and manage to keep up in both specialties, and I don't think it would be THAT much different to keep up with one medical specialty and a legal career. And I have yet to defend a malpractice case brought about by someone trying to practice law and medicine . I think anyone motivated (i.e. "crazy") enough to try and manage both is probably smart/conscientious enough to keep up with whatever needs to be done to do both competently, including not spending so much time on one that they can't keep up with the other. But the ones who actually try to do both are pretty rare--usually people switch from one to the other and stop doing whichever one they switched from.

Double boarding is different, there is more overlap. And they really generally don't do two distinct jobs, simultaneously. I suspect your view of what constitutes a "decent lawyer" and the views of many other lawyers differ. I can assure you that a lot of this guys peers spend a lot more of their time keeping abreast of the law and servicing their clients than this part timer, and you are kidding yourself if you don't think someone dabbling isn't doing his clients and patients a disservice. Most of the time the peers of lawyers hauled up in front of the grievance commission or disbarred had peers and references who thought they were "decent" too. You are kidding yourself thinking it's just a matter of motivation/smarts/conscientiousness. You need all that just to be above average in a single profession. It's a matter of there only being so many hours in the week and both being full time jobs, and both being fields where doing and seeing and reading more does have a direct relationship to skill/quality/knowledge. Medicine us not a field where you can close the books when you are done with residency and law is certainly not one where you are particularly good if you do that after law school. Sure, you could get by for 40 hours a week in both but you wouldn't be doing all those things a guy who is actually good in either field will be doing. And this again is from someone who has had a foot in both professions and has a pretty good idea of what needs to be done. In either field if you are conscientious, you should often feel guilty not having read/done/practiced X enough, and that's if you are only doing one or the other field. Trying to do both means you do a lousy job in both, or you give one a very half *****Ed effort. I don't see other alternatives because the expectations of each full time career encompass the bulk of every day.

Speaking from personal experience, I found it necessary to quit law just to complete postbac courses because I didn't feel I could devote the time necessary to take a course on top of the time necessary to be a competent lawyer. The latter was a full time obligation -- even when I wasn't at work I was expected to be frequently reading and keeping my head in the game to not commit legal malpractice. Being a doctor, even doing shift work, is a similar obligation. And I promise you that the time to succeed in a single course is nothing compared to the time necessary to be a decent doctor. Sure, you could do both if you didn't do all those outside things that make you decent/adequate/competent in the field. But you run a huge risk for yourself and your clients/patients. Bad idea.

Originally Posted by SpaceLeftBlank

Yes. On that subject, I don't understand the surprisingly high number of MDs who go to the trouble of getting JDs for no really good reason (i.e. they never practice law) usually through some combined-degree program. It's a lot of extra time and money for not much added benefit. Sure, law schools like to claim that there are lots of good reasons to get a JD even if you don't practice law with it, and while they have a point, it's definitely not $120 - $160K worth of reasons. If you want to do policy/regulatory stuff, you can learn enough about that by doing it, without having to bother blowing hundreds of thousands of dollars and three (or more) years of your life on law school.

You certainly don't see lawyers getting MDs because they think it will help them be better malpractice or health-care lawyers. Most of us who do malpractice work can manage just fine without them--the doctors we represent, and whom we retain as experts, teach us everything we need to know to handle their case. The only reason I'm planning on getting a MD is because I want to practice medicine instead of law.

I personally don't see a point getting the combo, but I do understand folks who opt to do a complete career change.

As a 34-year old, married, mother of two with a completely different career past, I am going to my first med school interview in less than two weeks.

I recommend you take your time off, join the peace corp and have some time to get to know yourself and seek out your calling in life. There's no rush on this. Maturity and experience in the world speak volumes to admissions committee's. You're obviously smart so you can always hop into a post-bacc pre-med course one day when you are certain you want to be a doctor....IF you are certain you want to be a doctor.

Good luck!!

Originally Posted by Law2Doc

I personally don't see a point getting the combo, but I do understand folks who opt to do a complete career change.

Me too, obviously. :-) I'm referring, though, to the people who go to do combined MD/JD degrees without ever intending to practice law--I don't get that, and there seem to be a lot of them.

Originally Posted by Law2Doc

Double boarding is different, there is more overlap. And they really generally don't do two distinct jobs, simultaneously. I suspect your view of what constitutes a "decent lawyer" and the views of many other lawyers differ. I can assure you that a lot of this guys peers spend a lot more of their time keeping abreast of the law and servicing their clients than this part timer, and you are kidding yourself if you don't think someone dabbling isn't doing his clients and patients a disservice. Most of the time the peers of lawyers hauled up in front of the grievance commission or disbarred had peers and references who thought they were "decent" too.

Well, as someone who serves as a disciplinary hearing panelist, and represents lawyers in malpractice cases, I think I have an above-average ability to judge good lawyering. Almost without exception, the people "hauled up in front of" my hearing panels have bigger problems than keeping up with their reading, I can tell you that. The MD/JD I worked with did a better job trying the case I worked with him on than a lot of the "full-time" lawyers I worked with on other appeals.

Now, was he a good doctor? Hell if I know--never saw him at work in the ED. Maybe he's a great lawyer and a terrible doctor. Or maybe he doesn't have much of a life outside of work and is content to devote himself to what needs to be done to keep up with both fields. Or maybe he's a genius with a photographic memory. But the world is full of people who manage to do "what can't be done" on a fairly regular basis. I agree with you that most people aren't capable of pulling it off for the reasons you mention. But I disagree that it "can't ever" be done. This is the nontraditional medical student forum--how many times do you think someone has said "it can't be done" about what we're all trying to do here? Hell, I heard it as a somewhat nontraditional law student.

And this again is from someone who has had a foot in both professions and has a pretty good idea of what needs to be done. In either field if you are conscientious, you should often feel guilty not having read/done/practiced X enough, and that's if you are only doing one or the other field. Trying to do both means you do a lousy job in both, or you give one a very half *****Ed effort. I don't see other alternatives because the expectations of each full time career encompass the bulk of every day.

I've had much more than a foot in the legal profession, and a fair number of objective indicators that I'm very good at what I do, and I don't feel too guilty about not being able to keep up. Granted, I'm an appellate lawyer, so knowing the law is one of the primary things I'm expected to do--I spend most days researching and writing about the law, and I don't get distracted by having to deal with stuff like depositions, settlement conferences, and stuff like that. I can very easily see what a struggle it would be if I did, though. And that's not to say that I don't spend plenty of time having different feelings of career-related guilt. Not knowing the law well enough, however, isn't one of them. Since "keeping up with the law" is my primary job, it's not very hard for me to accomplish it. If I had to squeeze it in between trials and depositions, though, I'd have a very different point of view.

Your point is very well taken, though--I wouldn't want to have to keep up with a medical specialty on top of what I do now. But could I? Maybe if I gave up having what passes for a "life," sure. Not sure it's worth it to me, though. But there are a lot of people who say that about me--they wouldn't want to do what it takes to be me, and probably, people say it about you now.

My point here is that not every lawyer, or every doctor, has the same experience. Not all lawyers are the same: trial litigators have a much different life than appellate litigators, both of whom have much different lives than transactional lawyers, who have different lives than in-house counsel, and so on. I know just enough about medicine to know it's similar. What it takes to be competent is pretty much the same throughout, but how hard it is to do it varies pretty greatly depending on a number of variables.

And one thing is probably true--even if you can be competent in both, I imagine it's close to impossible to *excel* at either field. I think if you want to be the best doctor, or best lawyer, ever, you'll want to pick one or the other and stick with it.

Me, I've just gotten tired of the legal profession, so I don't think I'm in any danger of trying to "dabble" in it if I manage to switch careers.

Originally Posted by SpaceLeftBlank

Well, as someone who serves as a disciplinary hearing panelist, and represents lawyers in malpractice cases, I think I have an above-average ability to judge good lawyering. Almost without exception, the people "hauled up in front of" my hearing panels have bigger problems than keeping up with their reading, I can tell you that. The MD/JD I worked with did a better job trying the case I worked with him on than a lot of the "full-time" lawyers I worked with on other appeals.

Now, was he a good doctor? Hell if I know--never saw him at work in the ED. Maybe he's a great lawyer and a terrible doctor. Or maybe he doesn't have much of a life outside of work and is content to devote himself to what needs to be done to keep up with both fields. Or maybe he's a genius with a photographic memory. But the world is full of people who manage to do "what can't be done" on a fairly regular basis. I agree with you that most people aren't capable of pulling it off for the reasons you mention. But I disagree that it "can't ever" be done. This is the nontraditional medical student forum--how many times do you think someone has said "it can't be done" about what we're all trying to do here? Hell, I heard it as a somewhat nontraditional law student.



I've had much more than a foot in the legal profession, and a fair number of objective indicators that I'm very good at what I do, and I don't feel too guilty about not being able to keep up. Granted, I'm an appellate lawyer, so knowing the law is one of the primary things I'm expected to do--I spend most days researching and writing about the law, and I don't get distracted by having to deal with stuff like depositions, settlement conferences, and stuff like that. I can very easily see what a struggle it would be if I did, though. And that's not to say that I don't spend plenty of time having different feelings of career-related guilt. Not knowing the law well enough, however, isn't one of them. Since "keeping up with the law" is my primary job, it's not very hard for me to accomplish it. If I had to squeeze it in between trials and depositions, though, I'd have a very different point of view.

Your point is very well taken, though--I wouldn't want to have to keep up with a medical specialty on top of what I do now. But could I? Maybe if I gave up having what passes for a "life," sure. Not sure it's worth it to me, though. But there are a lot of people who say that about me--they wouldn't want to do what it takes to be me, and probably, people say it about you now.

My point here is that not every lawyer, or every doctor, has the same experience. Not all lawyers are the same: trial litigators have a much different life than appellate litigators, both of whom have much different lives than transactional lawyers, who have different lives than in-house counsel, and so on. I know just enough about medicine to know it's similar. What it takes to be competent is pretty much the same throughout, but how hard it is to do it varies pretty greatly depending on a number of variables.

And one thing is probably true--even if you can be competent in both, I imagine it's close to impossible to *excel* at either field. I think if you want to be the best doctor, or best lawyer, ever, you'll want to pick one or the other and stick with it.

Me, I've just gotten tired of the legal profession, so I don't think I'm in any danger of trying to "dabble" in it if I manage to switch careers.

If from your perspective he's doing well as a lawyer, (ill take your word at that) than I'm comfortable in my assertion that he's likely not meeting his expectations as a doctor, because there simply isn't time enough in the day to be competent at both. Period. The amount of variation between experiences is not the equivalent if nother 40 hours in the day, so he's taking shortcuts somewhere. Photographic memory is irrelevant as that not really the skillset necessary for either field and not where someone who slacks off usually come up short. Remembering stuff is great, but pretty useless if your failing is not having time to read it or do it in the first place, or most importantly spend time dealing with patients and their issues and concerns. And most people with photographic memories don't excel in medicine, just medical school -- the skillset as a clinician is very different and you can remember everything and still be quite incompetent. In fact the one or two people I've come across who claimed photographic memories were, in fact, incompetent clinicians, but I won't presume that all are. The short answer, it takes a lot if time to do either of these fields well, and you can't dabble. Both are full time jobs, and ones in which there's always more you should be doing. if you are claiming that these docs are putting in the time to do one field well, then the only inference is that they are stealing from Peter to pay Paul.

Originally Posted by Law2Doc

I'm not buying it -- one career of necessity was taking a back seat, or this person did a lousy job in both. Having had a good taste of both professions, I can assure you that if you aren't devoting full time to one or the other field you are doing a crappy job and running a huge malpractice risk on a near daily basis. Honestly the amount of reading one ought to be doing to stay informed in either field is pretty significant. There are no shortcuts and no such thing as dabbling. Both fields are full time obligations or you aren't keeping up with the normal expectations. I would steer clear of these guys.

An EM doc could work Mon-Thurs as a lawyer and pull three 10-hour EM shifts on the weekends. You can hire a $65,000 associate (billed out at $200+ per hour), and spend 30 hours a week supervising and making court appearances.

Unlike scientific knowledge, the law doesn't change often. Outside reading is no big deal. As a Big Law associate, I worked on lots on novel, complex transactions. So all my research and reading was done on the client's dime.

Regarding legal malpractice, the standard is pretty high... after all, lawyers wrote the law on that. I personally don't know any lawyers that have been sued for malpractice. The most common disbarment and malpractice issue pertains to theft of client funds.

The medical world is highly regulated. I'm sure a JD will give you a leg up if you are interested in working in hospital adminstration, big pharma, device makers, etc. Many of us will be small business owners where labor, real estate, partnership & tax law etc. will come into play. Don't forget the first thing you'll do after residency will be negotiating your employment contract.

Originally Posted by Esquire

...
The medical world is highly regulated. I'm sure a JD will give you a leg up if you are interested in working in hospital adminstration, big pharma, device makers, etc. Many of us will be small business owners where labor, real estate, partnership & tax law etc. will come into play. Don't forget the first thing you'll do after residency will be negotiating your employment contract.

you don't need both degrees to do any of these jobs. Most in hospital administration, big pharma etc don't have both degrees. In fact more in hospital administration have just an MBA. And you don't get paid more and nobody recruits for dual degrees.

As far as the latter comment on negotiating and contracts, thats just silly. I would suggest that going to law school to do your own legal matters is the definition of inefficiency. You can hire a competent lawyer at a rate of a couple hundred dollars an hour rather than devote 3 years of your life and tuition if $25,000 a year just to read your own contracts. and that assumes that all lawyers are competent to handle all legal matters. In fact the typical trial lawyer is not going to be competent to handle complicated real estate, partnership or tax issues. And the old adage that a person who represents themselves has a fool for a client is pretty true, so you'll still be hiring someone in most cases.

I see nothing wrong with career changing. But speaking as someone with both degrees and having worked in both fields to an extent, I see limited value in obtaining them as a dual degree. There is little you can do with both of them that you couldn't do with either, and will ultimately be forced to choose to use one or the other.

I also think you seriously underestimate your obligations in the medical field if you are suggesting that a competent doctor does nothing job related outside of the confines of his shifts. This isn't a job you can dabble in. Shift work gives you more free time, but that doesn't mean you have no obligations outside of your shift necessary to remain competent. You show me someone in the medical field who doesn't regularly crack a book, read, look up stuff, outside of their shift and I will show you a lousy doctor. This isn't a job where learning stops at med school. That's just a vehicle to give you the foundation and tools you are going to use daily for the rest if your career. The real (and often more time consuming) learning happens as you go.

Law2Doc, you sound annoying. Some people are superhuman, you know...

Word to Johnny Drama. Question - with all the time you spent being against volunteering, could you not, as a Physician; have sought out a volunteer at your hospitals ER, changed the reality in which you perceive there to be a problem and change someone's life for the better? It seems a lot easier and more productive than arguing on the internet.

Originally Posted by HM3

Word to Johnny Drama. Question - with all the time you spent being against volunteering, could you not, as a Physician; have sought out a volunteer at your hospitals ER, changed the reality in which you perceive there to be a problem and change someone's life for the better? It seems a lot easier and more productive than arguing on the internet.

I was gonna do that, but then, um, I just carried on living my life.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRBMlAMgJis

I don't particularly care what the volunteers do and rarely see them.

If I'm going to take up a cause at the hospital, it will be to improve patient care, not to improve the experience for someone who quite literally is not qualified to clean up ****.