If there are so many miserable doctors, why are you guys entering this field?

[pageantry]

Being a parent or married is pretty much thankless misery for at least seven years too. Most of the parents i know will tell you they've considered murder-suicide at least once. But I think, you know, they feel it was meaningful or whatever in the end.

Granted, that could just be the kind of parents *I* know. :/

Anyway, all I know is that I overthink things too much to take any job that isn't fundamentally about making room for people to do whatever probably silly things they want to do with their fleeting hours before death. And I'm too irritable to join the clergy.

I guess I could just start a hostel, come to think of it.

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[Hammer Time]

Spoiled brat ><

Amen

 

[fancymylotus]

Amen

I guess my sarcasm was lost, etherman is a rockstar and deserves his fancy things

 

[Psai]

"Money doesn't buy happiness. It funds it."
-Tri723

Hell no am i doing this for 75k.

Nice man nice

 

[IlDestriero]

I guess my sarcasm was lost, etherman is a rockstar and deserves his fancy things

Don't hate me because I've made good choices and am successful, hate me because I'm handsome, and have all my hair.

 

[fancymylotus]

Don't hate me because I've made good choices and am successful, hate me because I'm handsome, and have all my hair.

Can't I hate you bc you're hot rich AND have nice hair?!

 

[Petrichor1]

Money and happiness/peace of mind do have a correlation in lower class. These are people who struggle to put food on the table each day and face many other hardships. It's an incredibly stressful life. I'm saying that once you reach a certain point where you are able to find basic necessities including education, from that point on money does have diminishing returns as mad jack pointed out.
So for instance someone who drives a nice car will be happy when they get a Ferrari but that happiness is not long lasting as they were not facing financial struggles before that Ferrari

To be more clear, the people who are unhappy with high salaries would be even more unhappy in poverty as the accompanied stress plays a huge role.

honestly, happiness is measured by the level of sacrifice one can make. If you are a person who just doesn't have the patience of depriving yourself from luxury (may that be cloth purchases, or whatever), you are going to be unhappy when you are poor and when you are rich. The person who knows how to save and negotiate on the spot (and I'm talking about the man who isn't afraid to say "I want my change, may that be even 10 cents") is always going to be happy because that person is the boss of his/her own life. When that person goes out and shops, if they overspend, they will sacrifice vacation time or other valuables that may seem enticing but are really lost opportunities now that the budget is overboard. If you can't master this art, then a lot of people (from restaurants you dine at to prospective employers) will dupe you and offer you bad deals that you will later come to regret because you don't value something immediately or value something to have prior research done to prepare for any regrets. The happy person is the one who stands up for what he/she believes in. That is why you may see surrounding doctors or even other professions being unhappy because they let the world push them around.

 

[Ladynerd]

Parental pressure, The guarantee of getting a job that helps people; job stability; money; using science

I definitely prefer math over medicine, but I want a job that helps people, and with math, that's not guaranteed.

 

[Planes2Doc]

Because I was way more miserable working a job in the business world, sitting in a cubicle all day doing meaningless work.

The first two years of medical school were the most miserable in my life, but now as a third year, things are looking up.

Looks, medical sucks. It is absolutely horrible. I don't care what the SDN cheerleaders say about it. It's not an honor to have to study non-stop and get yourself best up emotionally non-stop. But we don't go to medical school to become medical students, we go to become physicians.

So remember, you can work hard now, and have a grest meaningful rest of your life. OR... You can take it easy now, and work hard for the rest of your life doing pointless crap that you will hate and question your existence.

The choice is yours.

 

[PhillyMed777]

Because I was way more miserable working a job in the business world, sitting in a cubicle all day doing meaningless work.

The first two years of medical school were the most miserable in my life, but now as a third year, things are looking up.

Looks, medical sucks. It is absolutely horrible. I don't care what the SDN cheerleaders say about it. It's not an honor to have to study non-stop and get yourself best up emotionally non-stop. But we don't go to medical school to become medical students, we go to become physicians.

So remember, you can work hard now, and have a grest meaningful rest of your life. OR... You can take it easy now, and work hard for the rest of your life doing pointless crap that you will hate and question your existence.

The choice is yours.

exactly: I choose to delay gratification and invest in myself. It's not easy. But in the real world you need a huge investment to reap rewards ("you reap what you sow", etc...). I weighed the pros and cons of medical school; all the junk went into the cons category, but the pros clearly won out.

What makes it trickier is not anticipating the extent of investment necessary during school. That really disappointed some of my friends, who didn't quite know what was coming. I see them year after year...examples from incoming students: "I'm so excited to anatomy, it'll be a breeze studying things I like" -- despite not knowing what anatomy really entails.

 

[PhillyMed777]

Don't hate me because I've made good choices and am successful, hate me because I'm handsome, and have all my hair.

lmao that's 1 of your 2 redeeming qualities.
not being aggressive (i like your posts) - just found it funny.

 

[ClrkKnt]

Except that it's not "guaranteed". Not even close. Maybe it was a decade or two ago but now you've got to be much more geographically flexible, specialty flexible and willing to work pretty rough hours to get what many premeds on here describe as "average". (And there are whole specialties that max out below what's described as average on here.) Premeds understandably like to think if they make it into med school they've won the race and are set for life, but guess what -- it's not so. In a number of specialties the job market is pretty ugly, and people do get laid off when their groups lose big hospital contracts and the like. I've known people who after a protracted job search have had to take a job that didn't meet most of their situational needs, and I've known people who recently were part of a departmental layoff. I've also in my prior career worked with many doctors whose practices went belly-up. It's a premed fantasy that anything in this career path is guaranteed, sorry. It's better than a lot of fields but you'd better be ready to work hard, be geographically flexible and make yourself indispensable every step of the way because you aren't guaranteed a job or an income, other than on the pre-allo board. This "guaranteed" concept IMHO is probably the most dangerous myth that gets spread around on here, and I think it must originate from a prior generation where doctors had a lot more leverage (but things still probably weren't "guaranteed" even then).

And this notion probably creates an unrealistic expectation that leads to being a "miserable doctor" when you invest a lot of years and find that the work to stay afloat isn't over, and sometimes isn't even less than some of your friends in objectively riskier fields.

So my question to you, if you had to recommend any other career path that has a high pay and a decent job outlook, what could rival medicine?

Definitely not law, unless you go to a top law school.

 

[Law2Doc]

So my question to you, if you had to recommend any other career path that has a high pay and a decent job outlook, what could rival medicine?

Definitely not law, unless you go to a top law school.

You can make a good living in numerous venues if you have the work ethic and hustle. Don't be so narrow and think that professional school/higher education is the only route. There are plenty of "blue collar millionaires" out there who rolled up their sleeves and found a niche. But also bear in mind that if you put forth the kind of time an effort you are going to need to do to get into and through med school and residency, you'll do well in most fields (including things like law). So many on here reinforce their decisions by telling themselves that only Ivy leaguers make it in I-banking and only the top ten law school grads find jobs. That's an absurd self serving exaggeration meant to make yourself feel better about a decision that might not be the right one. If you put in the same kind of effort toward law as medicine, you'll get into a good school, make law review and do very well. So don't sucker yourself into a career you don't like. Pick what you like and make it lucrative.

 

[pageantry]

Likewise, pick what you like and make it meaningful.

 

[ToldYouSo]

I'll give you my perspective as a 2nd year student who went into medicine for 3 equally weighted reasons:

1) Money
2) Job Security
3) Intrinsic interest in biomedical/clinical science

I do think that someone can get into this field for salary/security reasons primarily and not end up being a miserable wretch. I suspect that one reason for the mismatch between all the miserable docs people have met (that was my experience shadowing; every single doctor I spoke to told me to find a different field) and the ones who enjoy their job are expectations that were either met or missed. Another reason is that I feel most people either view medicine as a calling or just another job. I fall into the latter category and many of my friends from school also fit into it as evidenced by our generation placing more value on lifestyle and work-life balance and the rise of shift work based schedules (EM, CC, hospitalist etc...) as well as the high competitiveness of lifestyle friendly specialties vs. perhaps some of the older guard who viewed medicine as a sacred calling that one should devote their whole life to. The bottom line for any pre-meds trying to make a decision in the face of so much conflicting information is to do as much shadowing as you can with a variety of physicians in a variety of practice environments, and get perspectives from people in various stages of training. But even that won't give you as clear of a picture as when you're actually in the field.

 

[NotWayneBrady]

Anyone wanting an MD or DO for the paycheck alone is gonna have a bad time. You need another reason to get you up in the morning and through long hours. You need a drive.

Something about this quote paired with your avatar absolutely killed me. Almost died laughing at my desk.

 

[Tvicl]

My honest question to you premeds (with all due respect) is why on earth would you ever want to be a doctor?

Many many reasons
1. My crippling lack of self worth, "I need a prestigious job to feel like a human being."
2. I like science
3. I think I would look sexy as hell in a white coat.

 

[Silence in ER]

Honestly?
1) Medicine is a secure field and my parents are doctors, so why not?
2) I think I might seriously be called to medicine. ( yeah, I know that is kinda of weird to say)
3) I love anatomy and daydream of IDK being able to take a human apart and put him back together, see that glorious heart beating on an OR table, know that my work and stitches is living inside of someone holding them together...
4) meh, I just really like biology/

 

[Pagan FutureDoc]

I'm an overachiever with a god complex, what else am I gonna do?

I spent most my life drifting fairly aimlessly because of my inability to cope with my mental illnesses.
I've put that behind me and now I want to help people.
I know I can do this. I can make meaningful improvements in people's lives. I can give someone a chance a life where they didn't have one before.

Mostly I see medicine as a way for my life to count for something.

 

[clippers50fan]

Being a miserable doctor sounds way more interesting than being a miserable 9-5 desk worker.

 

[NotWayneBrady]

Being a miserable doctor sounds way more interesting than being a miserable 9-5 desk worker.

Currently miserable 9-5 desk worker.

I'm willing to try anything at this point.

 

[whatever5]

I'm already miserable, what's the diff.

 

[Lost in Translation]

Because no one thinks of the children.

 

[Cytarabine]

Being a miserable doctor sounds way more interesting than being a miserable 9-5 desk worker.

Yea, if I'm going to be miserable, I'd rather be a miserable 9-5er than a miserable 5-7er

 

[Theafoni]

idk I kind of just decided medicine would be cool.

 

[Theafoni]

So I did the math and found that ...

After applying some simple algebra to some trite phrases and cliches a new understanding can be reached of the secret to wealth and success. Here it goes.

Given:
Knowledge is Power
Time is Money
and as every engineer knows,
Power is Work over Time.

So, substituting algebraic equations for these time worn bits of wisdom, we get:

K = P (1)
T = M (2)
P = W/T (3)

Now, do a few simple substitutions:
Put W/T in for P in equation (1), which yields:

K = W/T (4)

Put M in for T into equation (4), which yields:

K = W/M (5).

Now we've got something. Expanding back into English, we get:

Knowledge equals Work over Money.
What this MEANS is that:

1. The More You Know, the More Work You Do, and 2. The More You Know, the Less Money You Make.
Solving for Money, we get:

M = W/K (6)

Money equals Work Over Knowledge.
From equation (6) we see that Money approaches infinity as Knowledge approaches 0, regardless of the Work done. What THIS MEANS is:

The More you Make, the Less you Know.
Solving for Work, we get W = M K (7)

Work equals Money times Knowledge From equation (7) we see that Work approaches 0 as Knowledge approaches 0. What THIS MEANS is:

The stupid rich do little or no work.
Working out the socioeconomic implications of this breakthrough is left as an exercise for the reader.

 

[WedgeDawg]

So I did the math and found that ...

After applying some simple algebra to some trite phrases and cliches a new understanding can be reached of the secret to wealth and success. Here it goes.

Given:
Knowledge is Power
Time is Money
and as every engineer knows,
Power is Work over Time.

So, substituting algebraic equations for these time worn bits of wisdom, we get:

K = P (1)
T = M (2)
P = W/T (3)

Now, do a few simple substitutions:
Put W/T in for P in equation (1), which yields:

K = W/T (4)

Put M in for T into equation (4), which yields:

K = W/M (5).

Now we've got something. Expanding back into English, we get:

Knowledge equals Work over Money.
What this MEANS is that:

1. The More You Know, the More Work You Do, and 2. The More You Know, the Less Money You Make.
Solving for Money, we get:

M = W/K (6)

Money equals Work Over Knowledge.
From equation (6) we see that Money approaches infinity as Knowledge approaches 0, regardless of the Work done. What THIS MEANS is:

The More you Make, the Less you Know.
Solving for Work, we get W = M K (7)

Work equals Money times Knowledge From equation (7) we see that Work approaches 0 as Knowledge approaches 0. What THIS MEANS is:

The stupid rich do little or no work.
Working out the socioeconomic implications of this breakthrough is left as an exercise for the reader.

I think you have too much time on your hands.

 

[BluMist]

says the person who wrote a thesis on WARS - http://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/wedgedawgs-applicant-rating-system.1131149/

I think you have too much time on your hands.

 

[WedgeDawg]

says the person who wrote a thesis on WARS - http://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/wedgedawgs-applicant-rating-system.1131149/

Hey I wasn't in med school yet, what else was I supposed to do with my time?

 

[BluMist]

nor is the person* you responded to in the first place, so unacceptable excuse

*assuming @Theafoni "pre-medical" status is accurate, unlike some pre-speech pathologist wannabe that I know *cough*

Hey I wasn't in med school yet, what else was I supposed to do with my time?

 

[Theafoni]

I think you have too much time on your hands.

Procrastination is incredible

 

[BluMist]

According to your "math", procrastination -> increase in T -> decrease in K -> increase in M

QED

Procrastination is incredible

 

[allantois]

Most physicians are not business savvy enough to make the kind of income medicine brings by pursuing avenues outside of medicine.

I also think that all the currently miserable folks out there who are banking on deriving all their happiness from a *job* are only looking to contribute to the high career dissatisfaction rates seen in medicine.

Let me leave you with a quote: "Job is not your life", Dr. Pimple Popper

 

[JohnConstantine511]

Some people are love parts of their job enough that they are willing to put up with the crap to do those things they love. The question is how much you are willing to suffer to do what you enjoy?