Selling out after Med School

[shouldabeenRN]

So with all the threads devoted to "I made a huge mistake going into med school", I started to wonder: What do you do with an MD if you don't go into clinical medicine? Granted, some fields aren't clinical, but if you don't go into those, what can you do with an MD that isn't patient oriented? Someone mentioned in the forums that you can sell out and go work for Big Pharma. Will you do pharm research or sales or what? To whom does one sell-out in with an MD?

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[mave]

Go here: http://www.medschoolhell.com

 

[njbmd]

Having an MD, like any other terminal degree, gives you more options than clinical practice. Though most people seek an MD/DO to practice clinically, many opt for sales, broadcasting, writing, health policy, research and other vocations. After all, if you earn an MD/DO, it's yours (you likely paid dearly for it both financially and mentally) to do with what you want. No "sell-out" but other avenues to pursue besides that clinical route. For sure, everyone with an MD/DO shouldn't enter clinical practice if not interested in clinical practice.

 

[LifetimeDoc]

You can always sell diet pills on television. 🙄

 

[shouldabeenRN]

Go here: http://www.medschoolhell.com

Sweet!

 

[Shredder]

For a while I was pondering selling out but now I think I'll just do a residency in rads or path, which are as far from the traditional conception of medicine as you can get I feel. Residency gives the best ROI on med school for sure.

I have heard of jobs in the pharm or biotech industry. There are also research positions. Or you can write articles or sell pills or other things. Nothing will be as financially rewarding as residency I think.

 

[RxnMan]

...I have heard of jobs in the pharm or biotech industry. There are also research positions. Or you can write articles or sell pills or other things. Nothing will be as financially rewarding as residency I think.

Starting up an urgent care network...?

 

[kronickm]

You can always sell diet pills on television. 🙄

OMG hilarious.

I'm John Doe D.O. PGY1 Resident, and I guarantee that Xyzienzed Works! I used to be 300 pounds and now look at me!

(no offense meant to D.O.s but I was thinking of one specific commerical with a guy who claimed to be a PGY1 D.O.)

 

[DrZeke]

So with all the threads devoted to "I made a huge mistake going into med school", I started to wonder: What do you do with an MD if you don't go into clinical medicine? Granted, some fields aren't clinical, but if you don't go into those, what can you do with an MD that isn't patient oriented? Someone mentioned in the forums that you can sell out and go work for Big Pharma. Will you do pharm research or sales or what? To whom does one sell-out in with an MD?

You can do research or academic medicine where you don't do a lot of clinical stuff. Or you can become an administrator, especially if you get an MPH or MBA...

 

[dantt]

Some people call it selling out, others call it cashing in.

 

[Babylonian]

An MD is not considered a terminal degree. Medical school is still considered to be undergraduate education albeit an expensive undergraduate education. MPH, an MBA, or an PhD is a terminal degree.

Having an MD, like any other terminal degree, gives you more options than clinical practice. Though most people seek an MD/DO to practice clinically, many opt for sales, broadcasting, writing, health policy, research and other vocations. After all, if you earn an MD/DO, it's yours (you likely paid dearly for it both financially and mentally) to do with what you want. No "sell-out" but other avenues to pursue besides that clinical route. For sure, everyone with an MD/DO shouldn't enter clinical practice if not interested in clinical practice.

 

[Misterioso]

Selling out? It's every man for himself in this profession. Who cares what a bunch of people who you'll most likely never again see after med school think. If practicing clinical medicine is your thing then that's cool. If you want to take your degree and pursue non-clinical ventures then that's cool too. Don't let anyone shame you into thinking you're "selling out". You do what you gotta do to take care of #1.

 

[deleted87716]

An MD is not considered a terminal degree. Medical school is still considered to be undergraduate education albeit an expensive undergraduate education. MPH, an MBA, or an PhD is a terminal degree.

So...what were those four years of college before medical school?

 

[LifetimeDoc]

So...what were those four years of college before medical school?

Pre-medical school.

Once you get into residency, it's consider graduate work or "graduate medical education"...but you don't get a "terminal degree". Who cares, you're still called doctor.

 

[-Goose-]

An MD is not considered a terminal degree. Medical school is still considered to be undergraduate education albeit an expensive undergraduate education. MPH, an MBA, or an PhD is a terminal degree.

I thought any doctoral degree was a terminal defree.

I know MBAs aren't terminal degrees. A former chancellor of my undergraduate university was shooed away from his job b/c the academics didn't like the fact that his highest level of education was his MBA. They wanted someone with a 'terminal degree'.

MPH?

I don't follow your logic.

 

[THP]

Who freaking cares what the definition of a terminal degree is? I think we all know what the point of the post was.

 

[Engin]

Residency gives the best ROI on med school for sure.
...

Nothing will be as financially rewarding as residency I think.

Wait, how? I don't get it. How is residency financially rewarding or a great ROI?

 

[Overeducated]

Wait, how? I don't get it. How is residency financially rewarding or a great ROI?

I'm pretty sure he meant that completing residency would yield the greatest ROI since afterward he would be earning decent $$$ 🙂

 

[Shredder]

Starting up an urgent care network...?

Interesting proposition, how does this work? But by that same token you can start up anything.

yeh, I didn't mean residency is the return on investment, it's still part of the investment

 

[RxnMan]

Interesting proposition, how does this work? But by that same token you can start up anything.

yeh, I didn't mean residency is the return on investment, it's still part of the investment

I'm stealing the idea from the blog MedSchoolHell, where you start one urgent care center after residency. You work to open up another branch, and so on, until you remove yourself bit by bit from clinical obligations and begin to run things full time. At the same time you free yourself from being an employee and become a business owner.

Without resorting to practices that violate the Hippocratic oath, I thought it was the best way to get $ with a MD.

 

[medhacker]

So with all the threads devoted to "I made a huge mistake going into med school", I started to wonder: What do you do with an MD if you don't go into clinical medicine? Granted, some fields aren't clinical, but if you don't go into those, what can you do with an MD that isn't patient oriented? Someone mentioned in the forums that you can sell out and go work for Big Pharma. Will you do pharm research or sales or what? To whom does one sell-out in with an MD?

Go into law school and practice malpractice law or expert witness

 

[LikeClockWork]

A family friend finished MS4 before he realized he didn't want to be a doctor. He didn't take the boards or do a residency, but instead took a job as a broker at Merill-Lynch and now handles some pretty big accounts. Granted this is something he'd been interested since he was young. I don't think many people at the med school were too happy with him after that...

 

[Onstarr]

Some people call it selling out, others call it cashing in.

👍

 

[Meatwad]

OMG hilarious.

I'm John Doe D.O. PGY1 Resident, and I guarantee that Xyzienzed Works! I used to be 300 pounds and now look at me!

(no offense meant to D.O.s but I was thinking of one specific commerical with a guy who claimed to be a PGY1 D.O.)

"Claims,"? How about he is a reisdent. He's a radiology resident in Chicago, and I believe he graduated from Nova. I've seen his name on the department's website recently.

Foot-in-mouth disease?

 

[thesauce]

Go into law school and practice malpractice law or expert witness

Yeah...you can always sell out your soul.

 

[Law2Doc]

Go into law school and practice malpractice law or expert witness

You don't tend to be a compelling expert witness unless you have actually practiced, so folks who want to go that route usually would do residency anyhow.

As for malpractice law, 99.99% of the medmal lawyers out there are doing fine without an MD degree, so you will have wasted 4 years and $150k in debt getting a degree you didn't really need, if you opt for that route.

 

[medhacker]

You don't tend to be a compelling expert witness unless you have actually practiced, so folks who want to go that route usually would do residency anyhow.

As for malpractice law, 99.99% of the medmal lawyers out there are doing fine without an MD degree, so you will have wasted 4 years and $150k in debt getting a degree you didn't really need, if you opt for that route.

Sure,

but the OP was not about the most optimal scenarios. The OP was about any options available for physicians if you do not go into clinical medicine.

You may not be the most compelling expert witness, and perhaps do as well as other attorneys with less education, however, it is something one can pursue nonetheless, should one decide not to do clinical medicine.

 

[Law2Doc]

Sure,

but the OP was not about the most optimal scenarios. The OP was about any options available for physicians if you do not go into clinical medicine.

You may not be the most compelling expert witness, and perhaps do as well as other attorneys with less education, however, it is something one can pursue nonetheless, should one decide not to do clinical medicine.

I guess, but it's more selling yourself short than selling out. 🙂
Big law firms can be pretty squirrelly about unconventional pedigrees and older first year associates -- they have a very much a cookie cutter mentality, so it's a lot harder to explain your MD and prior career path in a law firm interview than it tends to be to explain a JD in a med school/residency interview. So I don't see law as the best way to land on your feet if you do the JD second (rather than simultaneously). If you had a PhD and were interested in patent, that would be different. There are, of course, smaller firms and solo practice options, but the kind of cases you get that could use a medical background would likely be plaintiff work and your degree would be overkill and not something you would be paid extra or bill more for. So in those cases you aren't using the MD, you are really starting over, as you could do in any career path.

And someone doing expert witnessing who hasn't practiced is considered suboptimal because you are going to need to testify as to the standard of care in practice, so you probably will only be offered cases that all the optimal folks declined. If you can sleep at night doing that -- and are comfortable fairly quickly getting a "will say anything" rep, then I suppose you could eek out a nice living this way.

 

[medhacker]

I guess, but it's more selling yourself short than selling out. 🙂

🙂 Agreed, but usually people who get a medical degree and then decide not to pursue GME, feel that for them having to complete a residency is in itself selling themselves short.

Big law firms can be pretty squirrelly about unconventional pedigrees and older first year associates -- they have a very much a cookie cutter mentality, so it's a lot harder to explain your MD and prior career path in a law firm interview than it tends to be to explain a JD in a med school/residency interview. So I don't see law as the best way to land on your feet if you do the JD second (rather than simultaneously). If you had a PhD and were interested in patent, that would be different. There are, of course, smaller firms and solo practice options, but the kind of cases you get that could use a medical background would likely be plaintiff work and your degree would be overkill and not something you would be paid extra or bill more for. So in those cases you aren't using the MD, you are really starting over, as you could do in any career path.

You should look into the experience of Dr. David Ketroser, MD/JD. He does 3 days of law a week and two days of medicine as a solo practicioner and seems to do very well. And of course, he is very happy doing what he wishes to do. This would not be the case of the OP, however, serves to illustrate, that for the interested party, practicing both medicine and law can be quite rewarding. He has published both in law and medicine and does a number of cases for respondents as well.

And someone doing expert witnessing who hasn't practiced is considered suboptimal because you are going to need to testify as to the standard of care in practice, so you probably will only be offered cases that all the optimal folks declined. If you can sleep at night doing that -- and are comfortable fairly quickly getting a "will say anything" rep, then I suppose you could eek out a nice living this way.

Yeah, in the OP's case [an MD w/o GME], being an expert witness can be a bit of a stretch. Unless, she/he comes to be valued as an expert witness by virtue of the OPs publications - even those published before becoming a physician. In that case, the OP could be viewed as having special knowledge in certain areas. This would be true, particularly, in areas of medicine where not much research has been done.

Yes, these are more of the exception than the rule, in terms of what you would do with an MD/DO, however, they are possibilities nonetheless.

 

[Law2Doc]

You should look into the experience of Dr. David Ketroser, MD/JD. He does 3 days of law a week and two days of medicine as a solo practicioner and seems to do very well. And of course, he is very happy doing what he wishes to do. This would not be the case of the OP, however, serves to illustrate, that for the interested party, practicing both medicine and law can be quite rewarding. He has published both in law and medicine and does a number of cases for respondents as well.

From my prior career experience, it's awfully hard to stay on top of what you are supposed to know in law if you only do it part time, and same holds doubly true for medicine. I suspect this is only realistic in a minority of specialties and in a very minor scale. But very interesting to hear about nonetheless.