Hello,
A few days ago, I noticed that the Mayo Clinic offers a PHD for an individual when they are participating in certain surgical residency program. For example, I noticed a PHD in molecular neuroscience was an option for neurosurgical residents who were going to pursue academic medicine. Are there any other residency programs that do this? Does U of Michigan Hospital? I was not able to find an answer.
Thanks,
I don't know about U Michigan, but many schools offer this or permit this in some form. It probably does depend on how big your residency/fellowship program is and how much of a wrench you will throw into the clinical scheduling by going off and taking classes and doing research. If a residency or fellowship program is already very research heavy, then they are likely to be more amenable and this getting of another degree in "passing" will also make more sense.
The particular program does not need to even be part of the residency program itself. For example, Stanford has a program that funds residents and fellows getting graduate degrees across the medical center:
http://med.stanford.edu/arts/
The fact that it is funded by this program means that it is much easier to find a graduate program and a research advisor (since you have your own funding and don't have to be paid out of grant money). The three people I know who have gotten a PhD while in residency/fellowship have gone on to faculty positions at very prestigious places (Harvard, Vanderbilt, Stanford).
There are also NIH training grants that let you pursue graduate studies and are particularly designed for physicians to get basic science research training. In my limited experience, if you come up with your own money (e.g. from an NIH program), you can go get a graduate degree if the PhD program accepts you, and in many cases if you have an MD and funding, then you should be in a good position.
If you are interested in doing research in a very particular area that you don't already have a lot of training in, then this may make more sense for you. You mentioned neurosurg, so for example maybe a PhD in bioengineering might make sense for you, depending on your research interests. You can definitely get an academic position and run a lab without a PhD, but getting a PhD gives you some protected time to get papers out and pick up some new skills and knowledge that may be important in a research domain. Maybe you need more experience working with primates or rats or need experience with a particular new fancy kind of imaging technology.
At the same time, getting a PhD at this point may actually make a lot more sense than if you do an MD/PhD. If you do a combined degree, you finished your research, did two clinical years, then residency (putting your research in deep freeze), probably a fellowship, and then you are on the market for an academic position. Your main research work was done maybe 7+ years ago, and your knowledge may be stale. Your h-index may be a bit inflated because you have had some years for people to site your work, but you are still behind. You don't want to be a faculty candidate interviewing by proposing things based on obsolete techniques and technologies. This is not universal, of course, but it can be hard to keep up to speed in quickly changing fields when you have a busy clinical schedule (such as surgical residency) all the time.
At the other end, if you get your PhD while in fellowship, typically you are actually paid much better than a regular PhD student (since you are PG-x, your overall quality of life and financial situation will likely overall be better than someone who did an MD/PhD even though they got med school for "free"). In practice a lot of things are facilitated and smoothed out for you a bit, and you are in a much stronger position compared to other students since you typically have a much better handle on what are important problems, know how to prioritize, and know how to get stuff done. You have much more experience in giving talks and in responding to questioning, and in lots of ways you can be a much more mature, efficient and kick a** researcher. Then, your work that you present as your are on the job trail is then fresh, new and you have a lot more momentum for starting your new lab.
Anyway, just depends on your goals and interests and your current publication record and preparedness to lead a research group. A little looking, and you can find a way to do it.
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