Motivation for Entering Podiatry?

[JustMyLuck]

As a current 1st year student at SCPM, one of the things I like about pod school is the diversity of backgrounds as well as reasons for choosing podiatry. I have my own personal motivation factors. And no, they don't have anything to do with having a foot fetish!

Some of the most common reasons I have heard or can think of are:
1)better lifestyle than MD/DO
2)Specialize earlier on thereby avoid risk of not matching residency of choice
3)Alternate way of becoming an orthopedic surgeon (though confined to one specific area of the body)
4)Did not get in to med school (one of my personal motivating factors, forced me to re-evaluate my plans)
5) Huge increase in #of diabetics due to aging boomer population and increase in obesity rates, leading to increased need for podiatrists.

I'm curious as to what some of the reasons are that people on this forum are entering podiatry. Please respond, especially if you're a current DPM, pod student, or pre-pod.

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[krabmas]

As a current 1st year student at SCPM, one of the things I like about pod school is the diversity of backgrounds as well as reasons for choosing podiatry. I have my own personal motivation factors. And no, they don't have anything to do with having a foot fetish!

Some of the most common reasons I have heard or can think of are:
1)better lifestyle than MD/DO
2)Specialize earlier on thereby avoid risk of not matching residency of choice
3)Alternate way of becoming an orthopedic surgeon (though confined to one specific area of the body)
4)Did not get in to med school (one of my personal motivating factors, forced me to re-evaluate my plans)
5) Huge increase in #of diabetics due to aging boomer population and increase in obesity rates, leading to increased need for podiatrists.

I'm curious as to what some of the reasons are that people on this forum are entering podiatry. Please respond, especially if you're a current DPM, pod student, or pre-pod.

I wanted to be a doctor and live in NYC. I did not get into MD school either (28 on MCAT) and did not even apply to DO school. After some thinking a postcard in the mail I found out about pod school and decided to attend. I could not be happier with my decision and I think for myself I would have been misserable in MD school. I agree with the specialization earlier as a benefit to avoid the non-match issue.

 

[doclm]

As a current 1st year student at SCPM, one of the things I like about pod school is the diversity of backgrounds as well as reasons for choosing podiatry. I have my own personal motivation factors. And no, they don't have anything to do with having a foot fetish!

Some of the most common reasons I have heard or can think of are:
1)better lifestyle than MD/DO
2)Specialize earlier on thereby avoid risk of not matching residency of choice
3)Alternate way of becoming an orthopedic surgeon (though confined to one specific area of the body)
4)Did not get in to med school (one of my personal motivating factors, forced me to re-evaluate my plans)
5) Huge increase in #of diabetics due to aging boomer population and increase in obesity rates, leading to increased need for podiatrists.

I'm curious as to what some of the reasons are that people on this forum are entering podiatry. Please respond, especially if you're a current DPM, pod student, or pre-pod.

I want to go into Podiatry because of better hours than MD/DO's, I've worked two years in a large level one trama center and know that I don't want to work as much as MD/DO's. (Yeah, they make good $$$, but not that great considering how much time and family life they have to give up.) Also, I like the idea of seeing the patient all the way through the entire medical process, consultation, preoperative, surgical, postoperative, and follow ups. After seeing first hand how many years MD/DO's go through just to be a patients specialist for one or two organs, being a whole foot doctor seems very good. I have always been torn between becoming a family doctor and a surgeon, I have a passion to sit down and talk to patients about their problems, while on the other hand, I have very strong manual dexterity skills and enjoy fixing up things with my hands. So becoming a Podiatrist seems like a good mix patient care that I enjoy. I am partial to the foot because of a previous lawn mower accident that left me with over 100 stitches in my foot/ankle and not able to walk for a while. So I strongly believe that peoples feet is very important to their overall physical and emotional health.

Also, I really liked the idea of getting some scholarship $$ so I would not end up have a debt of >$200k (tuition of DO school is about $35,000/year) and ending up in some rural southern area managing a bad case of herpes, no offense. Being a Podiatrist I can somewhat manage my tuition $$ and choose where I want to live.

After thinking some things over, I dropped all of my DO applications this year and am very excited to attend SCPM.