What are the downsides of being a family physician vs. a general dentist?
Downsides of Being a Family Physician
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What i mean w/ regards to my question is:
All I wanna do is make >$100k in 3 workdays per week, take 3-week vacations 3x a year, be less afraid of having my license revoked and sent to jail for manslaughter due to malpractice. So here's my reasoning how:
If i become a general dentist, I may not have enough patients to fill 3 whole workdays (since that's all i wanna work). Family docs prolly get more patients thus can easily fill 3 workdays per week, since there r many more body parts to treat than just the mouth. In general dentistry, where u can do a bad job & it's harder to tell (don't get mad at this statement. It's the truth. Other than the patient feeling pain or the tooth does not APPEAR nice and functional, it's hard to detect bad dental work.) . As a family doc, u have to cure the patient--that's how s/he can tell whether u're doing a good job or not. As a general dentist, as long as the teeth are functional & look nice enough, that's all most patients care about. So u have to be really good as a family doc & much more careful than as a general dentist. One small mistake can cost a life as a family doc, such as accidentally writing an extra 0 after 15 mg, so the patient overdoses on 150 mg. Family docs are ppl too, so mistakes can happen. So it seems like, as a family doc, u get more financial security than as a general dentist (cuz u supposedly get more patient cases), but that financial security depends on u being really good, not making life-costing mistakes or ur MD license is revoked, & u less able to work part-time cuz ur patients have chronic problems like heart disease that needs to be monitored every few weeks. In dentistry, there aren't too many of these chronic life-threatening problems to worry about.
So I figure it's better for me to become a general dentist than a family doc. If I'm afraid of not filling up my 3 workdays per week, I can work in 3 different counties in the same larger city, so that I do have enough patient cases. I can teach to supplement my income, if need be, I can travel to several different senior homes treating their teeth as needed, which is every 6 months mostly for check-ups. If I still can't make at least $100k doing all these things in my 3 workdays per week, I'll specialize in endodontics/perio/ortho, and work as both a dental specialist & general dentist.
How does that sound? Recall that all I wanna do is make >$100k in 3 workdays per week, take 3-week vacations 3x a year, be less afraid of having my license revoked and sent to jail for manslaughter due to malpractice.
The good thing abt dentistry is u can own or co-own ur own office, thereby being able to set up ur own hrs. Only family medicine, dermatology, otolaryngology, ophthalmology, & plastic surgery allow u to own/co-own ur own office thereby allowing u to set ur own hrs. But those last 4 medical specialties r really hard to get into & u can do a bad job and the patient will know, unlike in dentistry where as long as the teeth APPEAR good and functioning, the patient doesn't care.
I'm just wondering if it's possible to work 3 days/week & take 3-week vacations 3x a year as a family doc? I'm afraid that since patients have chronic problems that r life-threatening, they'll want u to b available for more often than that. Otherwise, they'll find sum1 else who is more available. In dentistry, there r few chronic, life-threatening problems that prompt u to be there at a patient's beck-and-call, that ur colleagues can't take care of while u're on vacation. As an associate family physician, there might be lots of miscommunication mistakes if the 3 colleagues in the family practice take off for vacation so often. For ex., I write smthg on a patient's chart before I leave on vacation, but my colleague misunderstands what i wrote & prescribes the wrong meds.
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Let me know when you find that 200k job that lets you work 3x a week, take 3 week vacations 3x a year, etc, etc ... I wanna work there too.
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