Choosing PhD vs MD/PhD?

[LMac]

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I know this is a personal decision but if I continue changing my mind, I'm going to lose it (this has been going on for 1.5 years). I just can't decide which path is best and am hoping someone here might be able to offer some insight. Here are my main factors:

1. I love research and want to make a career of it
2. I do NOT want to teach
3. I love learning anything and everything science related
4. I love the idea of medicine as science, but am not especially interested in patient care
5. I am concerned about the job market post PhD

Other factors: married, no kids, not planning on them. Wouldn't mind becoming a professional student

I think I'd largely be doing the MD portion for better income and job prospects as well as having more options that don't require teaching. It will obviously take me longer to prepare to apply for MD/PhD (one more year of pre-reqs) while I can apply for PhD programs this cycle.

I am not hoping for one answer or the other, just that maybe someone can help me shine some light on this because I seem to have lost all objectivity.

Thanks

 

[Barley426]

Md/phd is highly sought after for several reasons, I'm sure you're aware of most of them.

The rigor of the education you will receive will be much higher under the md/phd program. This will help your research immensely if you want to do medically relevant work. Also it can give you the medical knowledge and experience to better see connections acrossed seemingly disparate areas that may lead you to a new finding.

Under the phd only I personally feel the classes are not very helpful. They are less focused on giving a thorough education of relavent medical knowledge, but are more focused on getting you used to reading scientific papers, which is somewhathelpful.

Time wise you're looking at about the same time, PhDs are usually 6-7 years (rarely 5) and combined md/phd is typically 7. The kicker is that there is diminishing returns as a straight phd student, you'll feel like your mentor and your committee just keep asking for more data to stall you from leaving. This makes sense because you're finally productive and rather cheap.

This is very different in the combined program where you are often rushed to finish your thesis to get back to med school. You get the perks of grad school, protected research time, experience writing grants and papers; and the benefit of a more thorough education during the md years.

As you stated the job outlook of phd only can be daunting if there is no grants in order, whereas you can always find work as a physician if you do the combined program. If you just aren't thrilled about seeing patients all the time, take solace in the fact that many md/phd staff are primarily researchers, seeing patients once or twice a week.

To me it is a no brainier, if you are competitive enough to get offered md/phd you had better accept it.

 

[Neuronix]

Time wise you're looking at about the same time, PhDs are usually 6-7 years (rarely 5) and combined md/phd is typically 7. The kicker is that there is diminishing returns as a straight phd student, you'll feel like your mentor and your committee just keep asking for more data to stall you from leaving. This makes sense because you're finally productive and rather cheap.

This view is overly rosy. MD/PhD is typically 8 years, rarely 7 nowadays. There is also diminishing returns as an MD/PhD program and certainly MD/PhDs get stalled from leaving lab as well.

As you stated the job outlook of phd only can be daunting if there is no grants in order, whereas you can always find work as a physician if you do the combined program. If you just aren't thrilled about seeing patients all the time, take solace in the fact that many md/phd staff are primarily researchers, seeing patients once or twice a week.

You can't have it both ways. MD/PhDs don't automatically have an easier time getting grants compared to PhDs. If you aren't thrilled about seeing patients, you still must get the large grants or you'll be doing clinical work. That said, you only need to see patients during medical school. Afterwards you can always do residency in pathology.