Best education path for Psychiatric research

[KPZ]

Hi all,
I have been wrestling with this question ever since high school and thought I'd pose it one last time on this forum.

Bare bones background: I have a math/business analyst background and am going to enter an MPH program in the fall, specializing in psychiatric epidemiology.

I do not want to be a clinician. I want to do psychiatric research with emphasis on causes and risk factors of severe mental illnesses with the goal of down the line being able to influence the development of better treatments. I am a "multidisciplinary" person by nature; I like writing, reading, math, science, law, psychology, philosophy, etc., so it's very important to me to have an educational background that provides many opportunities. For these reasons, I decided to enter the health world through epidemiology.

I recently discussed this with an MD/PhD who emphatically recommended I go to medical school because he felt there are more funding opportunities for MDs, and if research doesn't pan out, an MD can always see patients.

I have "always wanted" to go to medical school like so many people do, but I'm wrestling with whether it truly is worth the time and money investment and whether or not it will help me achieve my goals any more than a PhD or DrPH would. I don't care about salary. The curriculum, workload, and expense really aren't what would deter me from medical school. Mostly, I really hate bureaucracy and I feel like the whole MD path is kind of like an academic and professional hazing, which just never really sat well with me.

What are your thoughts on the ideal educational path for this type of research? Is it really worth it to go to medical school, or would an MPH and perhaps a PhD (which I see as the path of least resistance) be sufficient to achieve my stated goals and obtain job security?

Thank you in advance! This turned out a lot longer than I thought it would.

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[LizzyM]

Do you want to take care of patients? Do you want to prepare for two years to take care of patients' bodies and minds? Do you want to spend two years doing the most menial tasks of the medical care team as a clinical clerk? Do you want to send a year in an internship learning more about the practice of medicine before moving on to a residency in psychiatry. Then you'll need, at the very least, a fellowship in research methods or perhaps, more likley, a PhD in epidemiology.

If you don't want to take care of patients then it would seem much more simple to do a PhD in epidemiology at a school with a strong faculty in the field of psychiatric epidemiology, do a post-doc fellowship and get on with the business of writing grant proposals.

 

[WingedOx]

Define the type of research you'd be interested in... Things like neuroimaging or bench work are one thing, but a lot of stuff in behavioral health would require you to be a skilled clinician to even understand what the hell you're looking at.

 

[mcloaf]

I do not want to be a clinician.

Anybody who tells you to get an MD with knowledge of what's quoted above is giving you terrible advice.

 

[WingedOx]

Anybody who tells you to get an MD with knowledge of what's quoted above is giving you terrible advice.

And yet I see people do that all the time for various reasons. Every top 10 school match list always contains a couple "No residency, going into Consulting".

 

[KPZ]

First of all, thank you all for responding. It's great to even have a platform to "talk" this through other than my nonmedical support network.

Do you want to take care of patients? Do you want to prepare for two years to take care of patients' bodies and minds? Do you want to spend two years doing the most menial tasks of the medical care team as a clinical clerk? Do you want to send a year in an internship learning more about the practice of medicine before moving on to a residency in psychiatry. Then you'll need, at the very least, a fellowship in research methods or perhaps, more likley, a PhD in epidemiology.

If you don't want to take care of patients then it would seem much more simple to do a PhD in epidemiology at a school with a strong faculty in the field of psychiatric epidemiology, do a post-doc fellowship and get on with the business of writing grant proposals.

Define the type of research you'd be interested in... Things like neuroimaging or bench work are one thing, but a lot of stuff in behavioral health would require you to be a skilled clinician to even understand what the hell you're looking at.

I need to clarify that I have no scientific research experience. Or clinical experience (other than shadowing). This is partially why I am going the MPH route first; to gain transdisciplinary exposure to research and various academic and professional environments.

However, the MPH only takes 2 years and as an adult trying to get a move on with a career change, I have a few pre-reqs I would need to take care of and the MCAT, so I'm trying to make as firm of a decision as possible with the understanding that it could change once I'm in school.

So that all being said, I would enjoy clinical work, but I don't like the 5-10 minute appointment, diagnose and prescribe, model that's being used in psychiatry currently. I also don't want to spend a lot of years of my life on call and working fluctuating hours and so on. That's why I'm not particularly interested in making an entire career out of clinical work, but I wouldn't mind it and would probably enjoy it. I like taking care of others, enjoyed volunteer work at hospitals, and so on.

The type of research I'm not going to be able to speak very intelligently on, but I am not a bench lab type of person, more of a data analyst, project development/management, writer, "book" research type of person (like I said, I'm a business analyst right now). Also, I can be very visual. I thought about neuroscience for a while and that appealed to me.

I did wade through several MD vs PhD threads and they scared the bejeezus out of me with regards to job security and funding availability for PhDs. I don't care if I'm making 60k vs 200k, but I surely don't want to be making much less than that or worse, unemployed.

Thanks again for reading through this and providing your thoughts. I know this is a stereotypical "what should I do?" thread and I'm glad anyone even replied!

 

[WingedOx]

You'll never be unemployed as a psych MD, that's for sure. While the salaries aren't exorbitant, job demand is high and isn't likely to decline anytime soon.

 

[mcloaf]

And yet I see people do that all the time for various reasons. Every top 10 school match list always contains a couple "No residency, going into Consulting".

How many of those people started medical school already knowing they didn't plan to practice? I'm genuinely curious. The classmates I know who are interested in management/consulting didn't come in with the attitude that they were never planning on practicing or completing a residency.

I also think it's safe to say that the job market in terms of employability and compensation looks different for somebody going into consulting than it does for somebody hoping to do psych research.

At this point it probably doesn't matter since OP clearly didn't mean his "I don't want to be a clinician" phrase as literally as I interpreted it.