So why not MD/PhD?

[PremedSurvivor]

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I enjoyed research during my undergraduate years, but I want a career that involves greater human interaction. I'm honestly not sure whether or not I want to incorporate research into my future career. How do you answer this question without potentially insulting the interviewer (if they're researchers)?

 

[Reckoner]

I enjoyed research during my undergraduate years, but I want a career that involves greater human interaction. I'm honestly not sure whether or not I want to incorporate research into my future career. How do you answer this question without potentially insulting the interviewer (if they're researchers)?

Just be honest. A researcher is not going to be insulted that you are more interested in clinical medicine. Tell them you enjoyed research and may incorporate it in some way into your future career, but at the moment it's not worth the time investment needed to get a PhD given that research is not your priority.

 

[dcamkl1]

Hmm, I thought your first sentence sums it up pretty well. Just explain it a little bit more--reflect on your clinical experiences, provide examples supporting your argument, etc.

If they ask you this, it's probably because they think your research is impressive and/or your application appears to be research-heavy.

 

[yellowfish]

I enjoyed research during my undergraduate years, but I want a career that involves greater human interaction. I'm honestly not sure whether or not I want to incorporate research into my future career. How do you answer this question without potentially insulting the interviewer (if they're researchers)?

Usually, the question is more why MD/PhD than why not MD/PhD. Unless you were extensively involved in research much more than anything else you did in undergraduate, you probably won't be asked to justify why you aren't considering MD/PhD programs. If for some strange reason you are, what the other posters have said is completely true.

 

[Microglia]

Usually, the question is more why MD/PhD than why not MD/PhD. Unless you were extensively involved in research much more than anything else you did in undergraduate, you probably won't be asked to justify why you aren't considering MD/PhD programs. If for some strange reason you are, what the other posters have said is completely true.

I actually would disagree with this a little. I've heard of a number of people with good stats and maybe a pub or two getting asked this question fairly frequently. Easy out: you enjoy bench research but realize that your biggest passion is at the clinical level. Therefore, though you may incorporate bench research into your career, you don't want to do the typical 80/20 split and would like to focus on the patient side of things.

 

[ORU2Medicine]

Why not MD-PhD?? Look them dead in the eye and...

 

[ORU2Medicine]

Seriously though I was doing research with an MD-PhD student this summer who was on the fifth year of his PhD portion, meaning that his entire grad school experience will be 9 years when he is done. Now add residency and fellowship on the end of it and you're sitting on a huge chunk of time that you could have spent practicing medicine if that is what you're passionate about. Research is awesome, but not awesome enough for me to want to spend that much time getting a degree that I will seldom use in the future.

 

[notbobtrustme]

I completed a MS and was on my way to a PhD before dropping out and going to medicine. Not a single interviewer asked me "why not MD/PhD". Lots of them talked about my research, but no one asked that specific question.

 

[OCDOCDOCD]

I completed a MS and was on my way to a PhD before dropping out and going to medicine. Not a single interviewer asked me "why not MD/PhD". Lots of them talked about my research, but no one asked that specific question.

You already a PhD student though. I think most people would assume that if you were the kind of person to want an MD/PhD you wouldn't have dropped out of a PhD program. It's different when you the highest level of education you've done is undergrad.

I think this is more of a question that you're only going to run into if you apply to research heavy schools and say you want to do academic medicine or are otherwise interested in doing research while in med school. At that point I could see an interviewer wanting to see how much you've thought about your career as a physician and make sure you understand what the advantages and disadvantages of going for an MD over an MD/PhD are in terms of your career goals.

It's an easy question to answer though as there are many reasons why the MD is better than the MD/PhD since the MD/PhD is only a good idea for a very specific career path. A much harder question is "why MD/PhD?" especially now that these days that question gets followed up with "So I'm sure you've heard about the funding issues in research right now. Why are you still going into research?"

 

[chillaxbro]

Why not MD-PhD?? Look them dead in the eye and...

Basically this