Hi, I'm an italian student in the last year of high school, my dream is to live in Canada or USA and I enjoy health care jobs , I have to choose in few days but I can't decide between dentistry (5 years) and physical therapy (4 years) degree.. I'm not so rich to open a private practise , so I should first work as associate or public employer ( if I take dentistry) .. which one of these two jobs would let me easier obtain a resident permission in north America( preferably Canada) ? I speak well italian, Spanish and I should improve my English level, but I have time for this.. ps: I don't know which I would enjoy the most, it depends on case and patient.. perhaps I'd feel more free being a physical therapy, but at the same time I'm attracted by the money dentists earn; I like stand on feet and be healthy and fit.. thank you
Dentistry or physical therapy?
- Thread starter Lucane
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Well considering your background let me say this. Both careers are wonderful. I am aspiring to be a dentist and my brother is currently a practicing physical therapist. The dentists that make good money and are very successful are the ones who are great at communication. If you became a dentist and wanted to live in America you must become excellent at communication with American people and accustom to american culture. With physical therapy it does not matter so much. My brother makes around 75K as a fairly new physical therapist and his income is not likely to change drastically whereas my income as dentist will continue to get higher as opportunities come available. Both are great careers and in demand going forward you just have to weigh the pro's and con's
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You are asking in the pre-dental forum so I'm sure there will be a lot of bias toward people encouraging you to pursue dentistry.
I for one encourage you to pursue dentistry, mainly because #1 you can be your own boss #2 you make your own hours #3 dentists are one of the most highly respected professions (as opposed to being a lawyer, congressman, POTUS, or used car salesman)
At least in the US, dentists do make much more than PT on average, however, private dental schools cost over $60,000/year, with some places costing over $100,000/year. PT is much cheaper, around $40,000/year for only 2-3 years, depending on the program. You'll have much more freedom as a dentist, but you'll end up spending a long time paying off loans
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Something to keep in mind: if you become a dentist in another country and then want to practice in the US, you'll want to look into state licensure for international dentists. Generally speaking, you will need to repeat some training in the US if you wish to practice here (I think it's typically 2 years of dental school, but I'm not sure on the specifics of each program). The ADA has a guide for it here.
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There are other jobs out there that allow you to make more money that a dentist does. That is not a good reason to become a dentist.
With all due respect, there aren't many, so I'm curious to know what mystical jobs are out there that are attainable. Most jobs earning > $100-150k or higher are elite finance/investment bankers (risky job security, cutthroat replacement), senior managerial consulting (requires several mobility years, brand name schooling, luck), small business owners (most fail, too many overhead regulations and taxation), senior project engineers in tech (automation of services abroad, dilution of engineers with ceiling salary potential), specialty surgeons (top 1-5% of a medical class, 95th percentile USMLE, expensive malpractice annuals), and finally political positions (takes big money, mass corruption, gerrymandering to win). I wouldn't even consider politics or big business owners a possibility for 99% of people.
Dentistry remains a top 3 income in the U.S. relative to all other attainable professions IMO. Even better, dentistry is an incredible income in underserved areas in the North West Central States when you're literally 1 dentist per 100,000 people. The promise of biotech/pharma positions (medical marketing affairs, healthcare consulting) and computer science programmers (coding for digital) are equally attractive.
Any others I'm missing?
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Yep that bs gets tossed around SDN all the time. Magical jobs that somehow beat out med or dentistry. Guys unless you are genius programmers that are top of the line at google (an average google programmer does not beat a median dentist owner or a doctor), investment bankers that have been working for a while, or super lucky with a business, you're not gonna beat out the health field. This is just some glamorous BS people throw out.
The only exception to this I know of in reality is some dude who was top of his class in my highschool (where most of the top 20 go to ivies or were top of the nation in math), went to harvard undergrad then harvard medschool and is doing neurosurgery saying he could make more money elsewhere. Most of the people on SDN, quite frankly, do not have that level of extreme intelligence.
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Boomers have royally f*ed everyone up with their wars around the world and desire to live lavishly at the expense of future generations. Just look at shameless dental school administrators sticking the bill to students in order to finance their inflated salaries. Just about every career has some serious problems associated with it these days.
