I love kids and I love the idea of taking care of them, but everyone keeps talking me out of pediatrics! They keep telling me that with the amount of time, money and energy I've put into my career, I deserve to be making a hell of a lot more money than I ever will in pediatrics. Have any of you ever had a similar problem? How do you deal with it? Is there anyway I can make over 200k a year living in the northeast? Would my compensation be increased if I did Med-Peds instead?
I love kids but...
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Sunz81 said:
I think the bigger question you need to ask yourself is why you are going into medicine in the first place. If you are honestly just picking your profession based on salary then why did you go to medical school? "You deserve to be making more" - there are a lot of people who "deserve" to be making more - teachers being one example. That being said, you should choose your specialty based on what you enjoy doing and what makes you happy. You can still make good money as a pediatrician - maybe not 200K a year but enough that you can live just fine wherever you are. Good Luck with your decision.
I decided to go to med school for two reasons: 1. because I love medicine and helping people and 2. because i have to make a living somehow. I dont think that my wanting to get payed for what I do makes me a bad person or a poor doctor, just a regular person. I do love peds but I worry about my future and the future of my family. I just dont wanna look back in 20 years and think about how I shouldve done Anesthesia or something because I'm having trouble putting my kids thru college thats all.
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Medicine isn't really the best field if you got into it for the money. This isn't the fifties. All of my 24-25 year old college roommates are now investment bankers making a lot more money than I will. Of course, they all hate their jobs, too. It's all about being happy on your way in to work in the morning.
That being said, I had to think long and hard about pediatrics versus EM, but finally settled on the kids.
Step 2 in a week. Grrrrr.
That being said, I had to think long and hard about pediatrics versus EM, but finally settled on the kids.
Step 2 in a week. Grrrrr.
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Then the question becomes - would you be happy going and putting people to sleep (or the like) for the next 40 years of your life? If the answer's "no" or better yet "heck no!", then there you go. I imagine that there must be a few pediatricians well out there who are managing just fine, albeit not necessarily making 'big money' - accepting of course that 'fine' for one may not be 'fine' for another- I suspect you'll find more than enough children of pediatricians knocking about in College (I'm one)...
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at the median income of a pediatrician you will still be in the top 10% of income in the U.S. (the top 3% though make ridiculous bank).
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In response to the OP, I find it very difficult to think that you will not be able to put your kids through college on an ave 170k/year job. I have read this argument multiple times on these forums to support the decision to pursue a higher paying field. If you cannot stretch that kind of earning power into college dollars, then you need to call up your investment banker friends. It is sad to me that people put their love for a particular field behind their "need" for a certain amount of money. This is not meant to be an attack but simply an encouragement to sit down and analyze the salary that you need to make to achieve your goals. 170k goes a long way even in the NE. Remember that your money will be working for you with wise investments.
Regardless of what specialty I choose, I'm plan on doing a fellowship in pediatrics so that I can still be in touch with the kids. So it's not like I plan on completely ditching the whole idea of pediatrics all together. The reason that I like pediatrics though is because you get to see these kids grow up and pretty much be their primary care physician until they're however old. God knows I went to my pediatrician till I was like 18 or 20. Anyway, I guess I still have some time before I make a definite decision. Thanks all for your great insights.
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Sunz81 said:
Most of the people that have brought this up with me make wayyyy more money than I'd ever want to or need to
. I chose to go into medicine, and pediatrics specifically, because it is what I am passionate about. Doing what I love for the rest of my life is worth more than money. My kids may have to take out a student loan if they want to go to a private $$$ college, but that's okay with me- I think they'll benefit more in the long run from a happy mom who loves what she does for a living. Even if I choose to be a general pediatrician, I dont' think I'll ever struggle to put food on the table or shoes on my family's feet.As another writer mentioned, your decision truly lies in your priorities. Is it more important to you to make $250k a year (although you're miserable), or is it more important to you to wake up in the morning looking forward to going to work (even though your bank account might be smaller)?
That's definetly an option for me. But because of my IMG status I also have to realize that I'm working with a crutch. Its not impossible for IMGs got get into anesthesia, but it seems to be increasingly competitive. There's always the option of doing a peds residency and THEN doing an anesthesia residency and a one year peds fellowship if thats what I really wanted to do. Anyone know anything about peds-PM&R?
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Sunz81 said:
you won't be able to do an anesthesiology residency following a completed pediatric residency unless you have some sort of deal worked out with the program or a source of private funding. the gubmint will not fund individuals attempting to complete two residencies.
if you want to do PM&R, you should've been a PT.
I got the idea of doing an anesthesia residency from someone who posted on this forum saying he finished his pediatrics residency and has now been accepted into an approved anesthesia residency.
And why should I have become a PT if I want to do PM&R?
And why should I have become a PT if I want to do PM&R?
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Palmetto said:Medicine isn't really the best field if you got into it for the money. This isn't the fifties. All of my 24-25 year old college roommates are now investment bankers making a lot more money than I will. Of course, they all hate their jobs, too. It's all about being happy on your way in to work in the morning.
That being said, I had to think long and hard about pediatrics versus EM, but finally settled on the kids.
Step 2 in a week. Grrrrr.
Ummm, where did you go to school where ALL your exroomies are ibankers....isnt that a pretty tough gig to land??
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Sunz81 said:
i'm not sure exactly what the ruling is, but ever resident i've talked to attempting to do another residency after completing their first has gotten declined for the same reason: the government will not fund a second residency. it's quite possible your friend was able to get it privately funded through a group or some other source, or your friend is doing it a program that will fund it, but i'd have to say that person is the exception, not the rule.
PM&R is just PT with an MD after your name, that's why i made that comment. if you want to do it i say go for it, they have a great lifestyle and make a good chunk of change running PT clinics (at least 95% of the ones i know do that).
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funny, i'm actually getting that exact same response right now. i wanted to go into medicine to be a pediatrician, and now that i'm on clinical rotations, i'm surrounded by lots of money-grubbing surgeons, ER & IM docs, etc. who try to talk me out of peds, saying that i'll be working too hard and won't be getting the money. but here in miami, people don't understand that i didn't go into medicine for the money... i went into medicine because i love the kids.
as hard as it is, i think you need to ignore all the bitterness and trust yourself. sure, medicine isn't what it used to be, but as a pediatrician, you are never going to be poor. i know plenty of pediatricians with nice cars, houses, and boats, who spend time with their family, and love what they do. those people are my role models, not the ones who try to talk me out of my dreams.
just my two cents...
good luck to you
as hard as it is, i think you need to ignore all the bitterness and trust yourself. sure, medicine isn't what it used to be, but as a pediatrician, you are never going to be poor. i know plenty of pediatricians with nice cars, houses, and boats, who spend time with their family, and love what they do. those people are my role models, not the ones who try to talk me out of my dreams.
just my two cents...
good luck to you
jd star said:funny, i'm actually getting that exact same response right now. i wanted to go into medicine to be a pediatrician, and now that i'm on clinical rotations, i'm surrounded by lots of money-grubbing surgeons, ER & IM docs, etc. who try to talk me out of peds, saying that i'll be working too hard and won't be getting the money. but here in miami, people don't understand that i didn't go into medicine for the money... i went into medicine because i love the kids.
as hard as it is, i think you need to ignore all the bitterness and trust yourself. sure, medicine isn't what it used to be, but as a pediatrician, you are never going to be poor. i know plenty of pediatricians with nice cars, houses, and boats, who spend time with their family, and love what they do. those people are my role models, not the ones who try to talk me out of my dreams.
just my two cents...
good luck to you
Hey JD, thanks for the advice...it's nice to know theres SOMEONE out there who's like me! All the best to you as well.
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having "been there and done that" I can definately vouch for the bonus of making good money as a subspecialist.However, I could not imagine doing internal medicine, emergency medicine, radiology, dermatology, physchiatry, or even general pediatrics for that matter since they never appealed to me.
...waking up in the middle of the night or on weekends is hard enough and I am sure it's no picnic if you are just going through the motions to get paid
By the same token, I couldn't see myself doing any other pediatric subspecialty. I love neonatology and if I had to change careers, I would most likely get out of medicine all together and probably go to law school ( and sue obstetricians who do too many elective c-sections below 39 weeks......tee hee )
do what you enjoy. if you want to make lots of money, general pediatrics is not the place to be, and if this makes you miserable, you won't be happy.
If you think you can live on 200-250$ a year there are plenty of pediatric subspecialties that will satisfy your desire to do some form of pediatrics and still drive an expensive car
PS: my brother in law is a salesman. He works hard ( 50 plus hrs a week ) has an MBA and earns about 70,000 a year.
So I still find it hard to have a lot of sympathy for people that want to bitch about making 100,000 a year doing something that they really enjoy. Fortunately for certain of us, we still get to do what we enjoy for double or tripl e that
fishmonger69 said:
It is really surprising to see something like this in a Peds forum. You (we) should think about something before you say it. That's like saying a Pediatrician is a NP with and MD after it. Both statements are completely without basis. The scope of knowledge in PMR is immense as are the difficulties in dealing with a special needs population. The difficulties a Pediatrician faces in caring for a patient population at 200 different stages of development are immeasurable.
Having done a Peds internship and then changed to PM&R, I have great respect for both fields. Honestly I have great respect for every field of medicine, and we all should.
