MD How do I pick a specialty?!

[deleted674723]

Surprisingly Ophtho has only gotten mentioned once here. Why not Ophtho, OP? Seems like it could match a lot of your interests since it seems to be a good mix of clinic and procedures, and most of the surgeries are relatively short (I think?)

Eyes creep me out. I also don't like the idea of general optho the way I am cool with general derm. I think you run into the same problem here. If I don't end up doing mostly the operative side of optho, I'd be miserable. If I didn't end up doing the more operative things in derm, I'd be less satisfied but I can picture it being alright.

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[deleted674723]

You’re actually missing something huge. Most skin cancer surgeries of non-facial skin are not Mohs and are performed just as often by general Dermatologists. I am not a Mohs surgeon and I do 3-4 skin cancer excisions daily at the end of my clinic. Melanomas, BCC, SCC, sometimes cancers you guys have never heard of.

Also, yes derm residency is close to or at the top in terms of amount of required reading.

Very ok with reading. I like learning. Leaving work earlier and having to read at home is my choice every time. If even general derm has the ability to do these procedures, that makes the field much more attractive. Can you speak to the stereotype of derm being "boring"? Do you feel your work is or soon will be monotonous? What percent of your cases are acne/skin checks?

 

[deleted674723]

Derm... it is as good as they say...

There are a lot to do in derm. You can become a dermatologists with special interests in contact derm, psoriasis, cosmetic derm, pediatric derm, surgical derm, dermpath as your career or different part of your career. You can play with the latest lasers, technology or simply focus on bread and butter derm. You can develop your own product line.. Instagram yourself to become a celebrity derm, or build a derm empire by opening many clinics with mid-levels or other derm and become a CEO and phase out on seeing patient. You can start hair transplant practice while have your general derm practice to sustain your new venture. You can go into academic and easily establish yourself as a dermatology educator and professor. You can literally have many career change within derm if you get bored with one aspect of it.

Why derm is not even more glorified than it is now is beyond me.

Really giving me the hard sell. Can you comment on the stereotype of derm being boring? That is really the only main negative that I see. I read over and over that "I'd rather do construction than derm" and many competitive students in my class have written it off because they are sure it wouldn't stimulate them.

 

[Dr. Doctor MD]

I can't tell if truly dislike the OR or if I am just burned out. When I am in the OR, I can think of a billion things I'd rather be doing. This applies to almost all of medical school in general though. How can I tell if I'm miserable or I just don't like the OR? This seems like a stupid question, but I legitimately can't figure it out.

The other thing to consider is whether you hate the OR of if you hate just standing there retracting and watching residents/faculty operate.

I would rather be waterboarded than scrub into a surgery and observe. That being said, when residents have actually let me do stuff, ie close skin, easy parts of the procedure, cut stuff, it's actually a ton of fun and time flies by like it's nothing. But as a student that's only like 5% of the time if you're lucky and the rest is miserable.

I guess the point I'm trying to make is that you need to discern whether you actually hate the OR, or if you just hate the OR as a medical student since it's a complete waste of time. I know tons of people who love surgery and went into it and they and will admit that their surgery rotation as a med student was pretty terrible. Anyone who says they enjoyed scrubbing in for a laparoscopic surgery as a med student is lying through their teeth. That's not fun for anyone regardless of how much you love surgery. There is no worse feeling than watching someone else operate all day. Not really sure why the surgery rotation is so fixated on OR time. Just my 2 cents

 

[Angus Avagadro]

I honestly don't think I would miss interacting with patients, but I am worried about losing the interaction with other people and being part of a team. I haven't had too much experience yet with rads so I'm not sure at this point how solitary it is, but many suggest that it is the most of any specialty at minimum.

DR used to be a team approach. Physicians and teams would troop down to radiology to review the studies done on their patients. Now, only the rare Old School physician will stop by. Pretty much sitting in isolation most of the day. Most human contact is calling critical results to PAs. It depends on your personality. Some people thrive in that environment. If you need patient and team interaction, maybe not a good choice. BTW, I'm not a radiologist, FWIW.