Very confused

[reine1jb]

I'm going to be a senior in college, I plan on pursuing an MD/PhD degree but something is really bugging me. I've had one year of research experience, I'm doing AECOM's Summer Undergraduate Research program, and plan to do research my senior year, the summer after, and an additional 5th year before med school. I really enjoy research a lot and I definitely could see myself doing it in the long run. The thing that bothers me the most is reading about how after all of the 8 year training residency and post-doc/fellowship, most physician scientists become from what I've heard at least, extremely research orientated. Some never really seeing patients at all. I have a hard time couping with this because i want the MD so I can care for patients, I really hope that I can do research and apply it to how I treat patients. My question is, do most MD/PhD's side with the research aspect of it, or are there some that do clinical a little more than research. ie most people who took the MD/PhD route to have a different perspective on their research (knowing the clinical relevance) are there people who use their research to approach their clinical training in different ways?

I realize that it's hard to not give all your time to research because you're competing for grants with people who are doing research 100% of the time

thank you to anyone who took the time to respond to this very verbose question

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[RxnMan]

You should look at these threads.

 

[reine1jb]

You should look at these threads.

thank you for letting me know I appreciate it.....

 

[Circumflex]

Some people do only or 90% research and some don't do any research at all and go into private practice. There are a lot of options. To be able to do basic research and have a meaningful clinical practice, many things come into play. Certain specialties are more amenable to doing research than others.

Probably the most important factor is the institution. To do research, you have to have protected time, meaning not as many clinical duties early on so that you can concentrate on getting grant money. To do that, you need preliminary data. After you get a good grant or 2, it is easier to devote more time to clinical duties, but this all takes time, money, and the support of the department/school administration. So, getting a good faculty position in the right institution is key.

 

[RxnMan]

Also - check out the Mentor forum at the top of the main forum page. In there you'll find an "Academic Medicine" thread that'll also answer your question.