Stopping after Completing Medical School

[Grrr]

Hello helpful community

I'm currently a 3rd year medical student on my last rotation before 4th year. I guess I've known for a while that I really hate being in Medicine but haven't been sure what to do about it. So I'm entertaining giving it up and starting something new. I had a few questions, however, and was wandering if anyone had some answers / suggestions.

1. Is it possible to say, complete a pre-lim. year, obtain license, and then simply "moonlight" occasionally? That is - apply and tell them outright I have no intention of going beyond intern year, and be taken seriously? This would be the weekend job to support my weekday penniless self.

2. What kinds of opportunities are out there for people with an M.D. but no license?

3. Should the need arise, is it possible to say..in several years time, come back and apply for something non-competitive and get in? I do have generally ok grades - mostly high pass, all high pass in the clinical years so far, and a 227 on Step 1, so not a sub-par applicant in that regards.

As a caveat, I have been looking around a bit - at AMWA for instance - and still find things like health policy, etc interesting. I realize this is probably a bit strange but was just curious if anyone else out there had something interesting to share?

Oh and more school is something I'd like to avoid. At least for now.

Thanks!

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[thesauce]

Try a search. There have been multiple threads like this. In short:

1. Yes, it's possible
2. Many
3. Yes, it's possible

 

[Law2Doc]

Hello helpful community

I'm currently a 3rd year medical student on my last rotation before 4th year. I guess I've known for a while that I really hate being in Medicine but haven't been sure what to do about it. So I'm entertaining giving it up and starting something new. I had a few questions, however, and was wandering if anyone had some answers / suggestions.

1. Is it possible to say, complete a pre-lim. year, obtain license, and then simply "moonlight" occasionally? That is - apply and tell them outright I have no intention of going beyond intern year, and be taken seriously? This would be the weekend job to support my weekday penniless self.

2. What kinds of opportunities are out there for people with an M.D. but no license?

3. Should the need arise, is it possible to say..in several years time, come back and apply for something non-competitive and get in? I do have generally ok grades - mostly high pass, all high pass in the clinical years so far, and a 227 on Step 1, so not a sub-par applicant in that regards.

As a caveat, I have been looking around a bit - at AMWA for instance - and still find things like health policy, etc interesting. I realize this is probably a bit strange but was just curious if anyone else out there had something interesting to share?

Oh and more school is something I'd like to avoid. At least for now.

Thanks!

1. you can get a variety of moonlighting type gigs with your license and internship under your belt. You will generally have to pay for your own insurance, so the costs may be prohibitive if you only plan to work as a weekend job, though. Most people who go this route (usually not by choice) try to keep their plate as full of gigs as they can and ideally work a full work week to pay their bills and put something in the bank.

2. Lots of jobs exist that you wouldn't be barred from by having an MD. But not that many that are going to recruit you because you have that MD with no license or practice experience. The big issue here is going to be what kind of student loan debt you are servicing and whether you can find a job that pays those bills. It will be hard to duplicate a physicians income in an alternative path with no other experience besides med school.

3. If you are licensed and completed and internship year, you keep some doors open. It's harder if you haven't done either of those things.

 

[thesauce]

The big issue here is going to be what kind of student loan debt you are servicing and whether you can find a job that pays those bills. It will be hard to duplicate a physicians income in an alternative path with no other experience besides med school.

With income-based repayment, why is this an issue anymore? You could get a job making $30k/yr and only pay $170/mo. After 25 years, it's all forgiven. Granted, that won't work for private loans.

 

[Mr hawkings]

Are you open to working for biotech/pharma companies? You could also look into insurance companies.

 

[Law2Doc]

...You could also look into insurance companies.

Insurance companies and private banking always hire folks with advanced degrees as "account executives" (ie salesmen) in the hopes that they can cold call all their classmates, faculty and alumni to try and sell policies/investments. It's one of the easiest "ins" for these companies to get high yield individuals to stay on the line. I mean, you'd be quick to hang up on Bob the broker, but you might stay on the line a bit longer with your prior classmate/student, Steve. My lawschool classmates got a lot of this kind of job offer, and I expect the offers for doctors would be similar (although admittedly there is a longer lag between graduation and when your MD classmates have disposable income).

 

[njbmd]

It isn't likely you are going to find much with no board certification (not completing a residency in something). Even those health policy jobs would want you to complete a residency in something like preventive medicine (one year of MPH + 2 years of preventive medicine).

You could likely teach in some health care arena (other than medicine) or do something in research if you have some background in bench research. Pharmaceutical industries are not particularly interested in people who have never practiced medicine in some capacity (one year of postgraduate isn't enough).

In order to get an unrestricted license, you need a year + all three steps of your licensure exam but that generally won't get you very far in terms of clinical practice experience. A better course is to take something like an executive MBA or JD and do some job that isn't clinical at all.

There are plenty of folks who completed residency (BC/BE) who are disenchanted with medicine out there who will likely pick up those pharmaceutical jobs or even the moonlighting stuff. They will run circles around someone who has no board certification or board eligibility.

 

[DrBowtie]

McKinsey Consulting. Depending on your school prestige.

 

[Rendar5]

#3. I heard recently from my PD abouut an applicant who was very interesting and had good grades...several years prior. They were asked what they had done to keep up with medicine. There wasn't a particularly good answer. Point of this: if you're even going to consider going back to residency, you damn well better have something in your resume that shows that you're not someone that's going to need to be taught from scratch. You will encounter that question and you will need a good answer, and that's gonna be something that's very hard to come by if you're several years out.

 

[Grrr]

Great, thanks.

#3 was what I was most unsure of, so I'm glad that is a possibility.

I figured it was mostly a figure it out as you go type thing; having any kind of degree in itself is usually useless which is why I want to avoid more school if possible - it seems a motivated person can learn anything more efficienctly on their own.

As an aside, I have found some school's specializing in Health Informatics which would take me on as a post doc, interestingly.

Try a search. There have been multiple threads like this.

But none on the first few pages, and none that matched my first few inquiries. Sorry for pushing off that super interesting topic at the end of page 3...

 

[thesauce]

But none on the first few pages, and none that matched my first few inquiries. Sorry for pushing off that super interesting topic at the end of page 3...

Ha. I think that "super interesting topic" may have been this thread:
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=700833

Good luck!

 

[JonathanMD]

With those grades you obviously understand the material and appreciate it on some level. You could always look into academia and teach medical students...?

I'm sure there would be multiple opportunities for patient contact.

 

[Food]

You could probably go teach at a med school in the Caribbean.

 

[DrJosephKim]

I'd encourage you to explore non-clinical career options. If you wish to practice medicine, you really ought to complete a residency and pursue a specialty that will really interest you.

 

[chicksdigdocs]

I'd encourage you to explore non-clinical career options.

what are some examples? out of curiosity.

 

[Perrotfish]

Hello helpful community

I'm currently a 3rd year medical student on my last rotation before 4th year. I guess I've known for a while that I really hate being in Medicine but haven't been sure what to do about it. So I'm entertaining giving it up and starting something new. I had a few questions, however, and was wandering if anyone had some answers / suggestions.

1. Is it possible to say, complete a pre-lim. year, obtain license, and then simply "moonlight" occasionally? That is - apply and tell them outright I have no intention of going beyond intern year, and be taken seriously? This would be the weekend job to support my weekday penniless self.

2. What kinds of opportunities are out there for people with an M.D. but no license?

3. Should the need arise, is it possible to say..in several years time, come back and apply for something non-competitive and get in? I do have generally ok grades - mostly high pass, all high pass in the clinical years so far, and a 227 on Step 1, so not a sub-par applicant in that regards.

As a caveat, I have been looking around a bit - at AMWA for instance - and still find things like health policy, etc interesting. I realize this is probably a bit strange but was just curious if anyone else out there had something interesting to share?

Oh and more school is something I'd like to avoid. At least for now.

Thanks!

1) I really doubt that, with such poor credentials, you're going to be able to dictate the conditions of your employment to the point where you're only working weekends for any kind of reasonable pay.

2) Honestly, I don't think there are jobs out there for people without some real experience. Law firms, phara, policy groups, or what have you simply don't hire half trained professionals. They might be an option if you complete residency, but probably not until unless you have some truely amazing research or business credentials to back up your MD.

3) No comment/idea

My advice: apply to a non-abusive and non-competiive residency: either PM&R or a Family residency with a very low emphasis on Gyn. Reasonable hours during residency followed by hourly work after residency Or suck it up, do an EM residency, and then work 1 week a month once you graduate.

Honestly, working a full time job that you sort of don't like for really crappy pay for the rest of your life seems like a poor tradeoff for getting out of a couple of years of a residency that you really don't like. Much better to get through it and then either only work 1/4th the hours for the same salary or have the credentials to get into a non-clinical field.

Just my opinion, I'm only an MS2.