I'm not a "Doc"....yet.
As to numbers, those depend on you.
I have found that the best way to address the malaise of physicians today is by referencing Spencer Johnson, MD, best selling book, "
Who Moved My Cheese?" Essentially, the medical career landscape has changed drastically since the 1970s. The "cheese" has moved but physicians are still acting like the cheese should come to them. Life doesn't work that way, even rats know that.
Physicians have, in my opinion, the best academic/graduate degree possible in the world: the MD. Yet most today insist that there is only one thing they can do with their training: see patients, submit bills to 3rd party payers, get reimbursed a fraction of fees submitted, and accept their predicament. For being educated professionals, they have settled for a really poor ROI (return on investment) and crappy quality of life.
With an MD you can do dozens of things, all very diverse. Being a fee for service physician is just
one career option. Dr. Spencer Johnson obviously chose his path and did quite well. Likewise with
Dr Mehmet Oz, MD, MBA (TV personality, cardiothoracic surgeon), and Dr Michael Crichton, MD
who never did a Residency Program, never earned a medical license, and never practiced medicine), and so forth.
You stated you're a first year MD student and you are exploring your options. Good for you. However, an MBA is a very general professional degree where you sample different facets of running a business. If it is your intention to work for a health system, then an MBA may not be in your best interest. If you want to be an entrepreneur like me, start clinics, manage medical groups, be a consultant, work in industry, start a biotech/pharma company, etc then an MBA would be a good degree. However, as others have stated, you would learn more by actually working in the medical business field than by earning an MBA. I flew through my MBA Program and graduated with a 3.9/4.0. It was an easy process for me but that was the case because I already have many years on the job experience in the medical industry at a well paying salaried position. For me the MBA was strictly for my CV even if I did learn quite a bit of new knowledge in the MBA. Few physicians earn an MBA Degree, but when they do, they are in much more powerful positions because medicine today, as we all know, is a business. Physicians today in the health field are pretty much powerless.
You first have to decide what you want to do with your MD Degree. Then go from there. Know this, though. Physicians are miserable today because they are not in the driver's seat of their profession as their predecessors were. People with non-medical degrees dictate to MD what they are to do, how they are to do it, when, where, etc. Adding insult to bruised egos, they are also submitted to patient surveys and those are deadly. Physicians are earning less money with each passing year, while those who dictate to them are making more income.
I think going to medical school to work for a "health system" is certifiable nuts. But to each her own.
By the way, physicians in medical schools are leaving in droves, especially on the admin side. At my medical school, we've had a huge turnover with faculty and admins. Meanwhile, medical schools aren't teaching medical students what awaits them post MD school.
Happy trails
