Medical license

[eyestar]

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ok, i have free time now but everybody is giving me mixed answers about getting my medical license now, finished transitional starting ophtho this july. So i am just going to go with the poll. I know i don't need it, but having free time to do all the massive paperwork made me think about it.

 

[f_w]

- do you want to moonlight ? If no, keeping up a license is just another $200-500 per year of wasted money.
- in your chief year you will need a license in order to sit for the boards. But at that point you can already get your license for the state that you are planning to do your fellowship in
- more licenses, more headache. It is not like it gets easier after you have a couple of them. On the contrary, it gets more difficult.
- some programs require you to have a state license in chief year. You might be the only one seing a patient and it raises issues with supervision if you don't have a license yourself.

 

[Visioncam]

There is an oversight in the poll. A separate response of "before ophthalmology and/or at the end of internship" is not there. Some states allow you to apply before your internship ends and then they grant you the license on the last day of your internship.

 

[eyestar]

There is an oversight in the poll. A separate response of "before ophthalmology and/or at the end of internship" is not there. Some states allow you to apply before your internship ends and then they grant you the license on the last day of your internship.

Yes, but i wanted to know if i should apply now, and i highly doubt anybody got their medical license before starting ophtho and having matched for ophtho. If you did, i would like to know why.

 

[IEye]

I think people should apply for their medical license when they know they will need it. In some states, residents need only registration or limited license (sometimes called training permit). In other states, you need a regular medical license.

If you need a regular medical license for residency, you might as well apply as early as possible, such as immediately after internship or immediately after PGY-2 (depending on minimum requirements needed to get a license.) I think in a few states, you will need to get a license by the PGY-3 year. If so, why wait until the last minute and risk some kind of delay?

If one has a lot of family members in one state, they might consider getting a license soon after meeting the requirements. This is because the more popular states often try to make it hard for people to get licenses. Some states will grant you a license by mail, but others might make you appear before them if you had even a frivolous malpractice suit where you won. If so, getting a license as a resident with little record is easier than if you have been practicing.

Where are the difficult states? I heard NC is hard for optometry. For MD's (not this AMD or OMD stuff!), I heard it's FL, CA, TX, etc.