No, that was a fabulous response. Thank you very much.
What do you make of the jobs posted on the NHS site listed as "loan repayor"? Did any of your class/residency mates approach this option?
I wonder what type of jobs these are...some of them seem to be private practice/clinic type jobs in fairly good sized cities.
If you qualify for the repayor program you only get 25K per year and must do two years. Seems to me if the salary of the job pays much less than 25K than what you could get elsewhere, it would make it financially prohibitive.....thanks in advance.
Exactly, so you have to do the math. Do some comparison shopping, so to speak.
I don't know much about NHSC, although at one point I did look into it. There's scholarship & loan repayment. Scholars are obligated to work at a NHSC scholar site, so they get priority when it comes to hiring. You get into it while you're still in training. Loan repayment is something you apply for as you're looking for a job. The advice I got from people is that you negotiate the best "market" compensation you can get from that organization, then apply for loan repayment. Sometimes, some groups will pay you less salary because they know you're going for the loan repayment. And if you don't get accepted for loan repayment, you're screwed because you accepted a job for less pay. And so you have to do the math (including taxes and how it works for loan repayment). Like I said, some people are desperate for whatever reason, and will sign whatever contracts they can get.
One consideration you should look into is whether you can do fellowship if you choose to become a scholar. I don't know how that works.
The other consideration is whether or not you'd be willing to go where the job is, which may not be in a location that's desirable to you or fit your spouse/family's needs.
I know 1 guy who's a NHSC scholar and the jobs he was considering were in different places in the country. Some local, others not.
Some of these clinics are FQHC... "federally qualified health centers" which GW Bush expanded under his presidency and Obama looks to expand as well. These clinics may provide care to the underserved, underinsured, uninsured, but some will take private pay. They may be well funded, efficiently run, with good staff; but others may not. Your job description will depend on the clinic's needs. By law, they must provide care to adults, children, pregnant women, and (I believe) provide dental care. It's up to the individual clinic to decide who does what. Some will ask FP's do it all, while others will split it up, either amongst the FP's or others like IM, Peds, OB/Gyn. The nice thing about FQHC's is that you are part of the the federal government, so they pay for your malpractice and there is sovereign immunity (i.e. you can't sue the government without the government's permission... you can understand the malpractice advantage in that... especially if you do OB...)
If this sounds overwhelming, it is. But I'm glad you're already looking into as an M1 because as you're going through training, you'll have your eyes open to see what's going on, what you like, and what doesn't make any sense.
I'll give you a tip: If you're curious about some of these locations you're looking at for NHSC, either for scholarship or loan repayment, you can call them up and say, "hey, I'm a med student (or resident), and I'd like to do an elective rotation." It can be a day, or 2 weeks, or a month. Whatever. And most will open their doors to you to go check out what they do & how, etc. Every practice knows that when they take med students & residents to do elective rotations, it becomes an audition or sorts for recruiting. So that's one way to check out some of these places.
NHSC offers something called the SEARCH, provides a travel grant for med students to rotate in one of these sites. There's no obligation. They pay for your travel, housing, meals, etc. I did it & went to Alaska for 1 month. It was pretty bad ass.
You never know where these places will take you. One former grad at my program was an ultramarathoner. Took a position in Arizona on an Indian reservation for the very reason that he can run all year long. I personally have always thought that the Pacific Islands would be a cool place to work (on the beach) for a couple of years. So, it's whatever.
