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How did you ensure that you had come to the right decision?
Did anyone here have a hard time deciding between medicine and research?
- Thread starter Ihave Nonamè
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This is something I wrote/talked a lot about in my apps.
In brief, I had a translational research experience where I got exposure to the research and clinical aspects of medicine and through this realized that you can have a career in both and that you don't really have to choose one or the other. There are many ways to make this happen (MD + research which is what I'm doing, MD/PhD, etc...)
In brief, I had a translational research experience where I got exposure to the research and clinical aspects of medicine and through this realized that you can have a career in both and that you don't really have to choose one or the other. There are many ways to make this happen (MD + research which is what I'm doing, MD/PhD, etc...)
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I decided MD because it would allow me to do either one or both if I so choose.
A PhD will not allow me to engage in direct patient care. Also the job market for biomedical science PhDs is pretty atrocious.
I guess I played it safe.
A PhD will not allow me to engage in direct patient care. Also the job market for biomedical science PhDs is pretty atrocious.
I guess I played it safe.
boo234
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many med students and physicians are involved in research but only md's can take care of patients. for me personally, it boiled down to how involved do i want to be in patient care. if u are specifically asking about md vs md/phd here's another thread:
forums.studentdoctor.net
Is an MD/PhD worth it?
I love caring for people, I love interacting with patients and I absolutely love spending time outside of work. However, recently I have been contemplating doing an MD/PhD due to my passion for research. The only two things that concern me are the fact that I have to spend plenty of years, and I...
forums.studentdoctor.net
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deleted972488
I had a hard time deciding. I chose to pursue a research career and then realized I wanted a clinical career as well.
How much research have you done? How much clinical experience do you have? Either way, make sure you know what you're getting into.
How much research have you done? How much clinical experience do you have? Either way, make sure you know what you're getting into.
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In light of this coronavirus, I can't help but desire to help in the discovery of a treatment or a vaccine for this. I can't tell if this means I'd be better suited for research or if it is simply because this discovery seems the best route to ending this mess. Medical teams are currently left helpless at the moment without treatments, without equipment and without PPE.
And I am certainly not saying that medical teams are not making a world of difference...it's simply that with this virus and the lives it will take/has taken, there is often not much that can be done by the physician to save a critical victim of the disease.
And I am certainly not saying that medical teams are not making a world of difference...it's simply that with this virus and the lives it will take/has taken, there is often not much that can be done by the physician to save a critical victim of the disease.
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The general disposition of my PIs made it pretty easy for me, that and my personality.
Medicine > Research in my case.
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I did bench research in a biochemistry lab as an undergrad. I remember too many Saturdays and Sundays going into the lab to run western blots or check if my cultures had grown. I had heard too many stories about PhDs taking 7-10 years to finish due to a variety of reasons ranging from loss of funding to experiments not working. When it came down to it, MD was the way to go as I knew that I could most likely go back to research if I wanted to down the line.
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Absolutely not haha. The required labs through undergraduate courses were enough to make me not pursue research even as something just to enhance my application because that is how much I could not bare that environment. Obviously research is the grounds to how MDs treat patients so I know how important it is and may even be more important I could argue, but it was not for me one bit.
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deleted1032897
This is a good situation to think about the practical ramifications in addition to the personal calling. Like:
1. Will you be satisfied working in biomedical research knowing that you have a small chance of seeing a project through to a result that actually benefits patients within your career? And if you actually get to, knowing it will take many years to get there (except in emergency circumstances maybe, like the push to develop a coronavirus vaccine)? Is this better or worse sounding than situations where, as a physician, you end up powerless to actually save a patient when nothing can be done?
2. Are you OK with the fact that you will have to be continually securing your own funding, competing with every other person who wants to publish in your area of research (this will definitely happen if you are researching something biomedically relevant/has potential to earn money and prestige one day), and needing to prove your worth to your institution? In research, your job and the prosperity of your lab are never truly "secure" unless you continually produce exciting enough results and get grants.
3. Above all, will you be OK having a bunch of failures in the lab before you succeed? Will you be resilient and level-headed enough to push through, even when some of these failures may come from your own human error? And after weeks or months of preparation and money invested into said failed experiment?
4. In your final position, will you feel jaded getting paid not even half as much as the average physician even though you feel you are working just as hard to help advance healthcare? (Unless you develop, like, a cure for all cancer while working at Johnson & Johnson or something)
These are some of the things I had to ask myself when working full-time as a research assistant in a highly competitive field. Research has a lot of pros, can be an amazing job, and can definitely feel like a noble pursuit. But it really is a labor of love. How stressful the reality is outweighed the nobility of the mission for me. But only you can decide for yourself! Happy to answer more questions if you don't yet have extensive research experience and are still having a tough time deciding.
1. Will you be satisfied working in biomedical research knowing that you have a small chance of seeing a project through to a result that actually benefits patients within your career? And if you actually get to, knowing it will take many years to get there (except in emergency circumstances maybe, like the push to develop a coronavirus vaccine)? Is this better or worse sounding than situations where, as a physician, you end up powerless to actually save a patient when nothing can be done?
2. Are you OK with the fact that you will have to be continually securing your own funding, competing with every other person who wants to publish in your area of research (this will definitely happen if you are researching something biomedically relevant/has potential to earn money and prestige one day), and needing to prove your worth to your institution? In research, your job and the prosperity of your lab are never truly "secure" unless you continually produce exciting enough results and get grants.
3. Above all, will you be OK having a bunch of failures in the lab before you succeed? Will you be resilient and level-headed enough to push through, even when some of these failures may come from your own human error? And after weeks or months of preparation and money invested into said failed experiment?
4. In your final position, will you feel jaded getting paid not even half as much as the average physician even though you feel you are working just as hard to help advance healthcare? (Unless you develop, like, a cure for all cancer while working at Johnson & Johnson or something)
These are some of the things I had to ask myself when working full-time as a research assistant in a highly competitive field. Research has a lot of pros, can be an amazing job, and can definitely feel like a noble pursuit. But it really is a labor of love. How stressful the reality is outweighed the nobility of the mission for me. But only you can decide for yourself! Happy to answer more questions if you don't yet have extensive research experience and are still having a tough time deciding.
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In undergrad I thought I wanted a PhD and was groomed to go to grad school. I now work at a lab at a teaching hospital, which has been great, since I have easy access to both research and clinical settings. While some familial circumstances heightened my interest in clinical care, I also realized that I wanted a much broader scientific knowledge base. Most labs, including mine, are entirely devoted to a single disease, or a couple of different pathways affecting that disease. I realized that while this in-depth understanding of one disease was great, I wanted to know more physiology, about more diseases, etc. I then realized that it was possible to do research and even eventually have my own lab as an MD. Granted, I'm sure this takes decades of hard work. And finally, it seemed odd to spend so much time researching a disease without ever interacting with or trying to treat patients with that disease. Overall it seems like MDs have way more doors open to them: purely clinical work, mostly clinical with a bit of research, or research with one a month in clinic. I'm not entirely sure what I want to do yet but I think I would be happiest with some combination of medicine and research. An MD seems to make sense for this.
I am lucky to have an amazing PI and wonderful PhD colleagues/mentors. Yet I'm fairly sure that my PI's lifestyle is not quite for me. As others have mentioned, a life chasing grant money sounds unpleasant. One postdoc told me that they regretted not going to medical school and becoming a doctor for a couple of reasons. First, in grad school you belong to one PI, and that PI can be a jerk, get recruited somewhere else, run out of money, etc. and you're completely screwed. Secondly, since you're basically free labor and your PI decides when you graduate, you might not graduate for awhile. On the other hand, in med school you have many, many mentors, all of whom want to see you graduate in four years and get into a good residency program because it makes the school look good. And at the end of that you can still do research! This is the opinion of one person, but it made sense to me.
That said, I have learned many important lessons in research that I think will serve me well in medical school (if I get in) and residency, namely how to deal with feeling like a failure every day at work, how to tell my PI that I made a stupid mistake, how to use organization and hard work to (partially) make up for a lack of knowledge, what makes a good/not good mentor, etc.
I am lucky to have an amazing PI and wonderful PhD colleagues/mentors. Yet I'm fairly sure that my PI's lifestyle is not quite for me. As others have mentioned, a life chasing grant money sounds unpleasant. One postdoc told me that they regretted not going to medical school and becoming a doctor for a couple of reasons. First, in grad school you belong to one PI, and that PI can be a jerk, get recruited somewhere else, run out of money, etc. and you're completely screwed. Secondly, since you're basically free labor and your PI decides when you graduate, you might not graduate for awhile. On the other hand, in med school you have many, many mentors, all of whom want to see you graduate in four years and get into a good residency program because it makes the school look good. And at the end of that you can still do research! This is the opinion of one person, but it made sense to me.
That said, I have learned many important lessons in research that I think will serve me well in medical school (if I get in) and residency, namely how to deal with feeling like a failure every day at work, how to tell my PI that I made a stupid mistake, how to use organization and hard work to (partially) make up for a lack of knowledge, what makes a good/not good mentor, etc.
