What are the benefits of academic medicine?

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SoulinNeed

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Why are so many med students interested in doing academic medicine, and what exactly does "academic medicine" entail? Does it pay more? Less work? Do you get to have a research lab/opportunity? I know of many medical positions that require that you also have a faculty position at a medical school that is associated with the hospital you're trying to work at, but those seem like minor commitments, and I don't think they fit into the "academic medicine" that so many med students talk about. So, for the med students here that are interested in it, I simply ask why? Do you have to come from a certain type of med school to get involved in it?

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Why are so many med students interested in doing academic medicine, and what exactly does "academic medicine" entail? Does it pay more? Less work? Do you get to have a research lab/opportunity? I know of many medical positions that require that you also have a faculty position at a medical school that is associated with the hospital you're trying to work at, but those seem like minor commitments, and I don't think they fit into the "academic medicine" that so many med students talk about. So, for the med students here that are interested in it, I simply ask why? Do you have to come from a certain type of med school to get involved in it?

Usually pays less, but not always. Research is a big plus to many, as is the opportunity to teach. I don't imagine the work is any less, but could be wrong.

It is easier to get into academic medicine from a top school.
 
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I don't imagine the work is any less, but could be wrong.

In general, academic medicine is considered to be more lifestyle-friendly than private practice. This is because at large academic centers, you will have residents and fellows to take call for you, take care of your inpatient post-op patients, etc. Many academic docs also have protected academic days where they do research, teach, write grants, etc., and these are generally lighter days as compared to clinic/OR.
 
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Is a PhD considered essential for academic medicine, or at the least, a MPH?
 
Usually pays less, but not always. Research is a big plus to many, as is the opportunity to teach. I don't imagine the work is any less, but could be wrong.

It is easier to get into academic medicine from a top school.

What could one from a really low school do to improve his chances of getting an academic position?
 
What could one from a really low school do to improve his chances of getting an academic position?

Do at or above average for the field on step1. Academics isn't terribly hard to get into. Sure rural programs are easiest, but the majority of us will end up at another university after graduation. That is academic medicine. I don't know much about how easy it is to pull a faculty position after residency, but from what I have seen it isn't terribly difficult. You basically have 3 options post residency: Private practice, non-teaching hospital, teaching hospital.

The trick is getting into programs at top institutions and landing a job there after graduating residency. That is harder if from a lower tier school with average stats.
 
In general, academic medicine is considered to be more lifestyle-friendly than private practice. This is because at large academic centers, you will have residents and fellows to take call for you, take care of your inpatient post-op patients, etc. Many academic docs also have protected academic days where they do research, teach, write grants, etc., and these are generally lighter days as compared to clinic/OR.

Didn't think of that, but it makes sense.
 
Do at or above average for the field on step1. Academics isn't terribly hard to get into. Sure rural programs are easiest, but the majority of us will end up at another university after graduation. That is academic medicine. I don't know much about how easy it is to pull a faculty position after residency, but from what I have seen it isn't terribly difficult. You basically have 3 options post residency: Private practice, non-teaching hospital, teaching hospital.

The trick is getting into programs at top institutions and landing a job there after graduating residency. That is harder if from a lower tier school with average stats.
So, let me better understand this. Academic medicine (teaching hospital position) isn't all that difficult to get into (meaning, those from lower tiered schools, with average to a bit above average stats could get them).

However, if you want a position at a teaching hospital that is a top program, then it becomes difficult for those from lower tiered med schools to get in? Am I getting this right.

And generally, you just need a MD (no PhD/MPH) to go into academic medicine.
 
Didn't think of that, but it makes sense.

I would like to add that I have noticed that the income ceiling in academia is general higher than it is in private practice. Sure, many start off making fractions of their pp counterparts, but their salary potential is significantly higher. The other day I used a search engine that reveals the salaries of state employees. I was shocked to realize that once you become a full professor, your salary will be in the north of 300K. Chiefs and chairs are paid 500-700K. In fact the chief of cardiac surgery at one school in Texas made over one million last year.

Aside from that, most of medical "cool" cases go to large academic centers. This is very appealing to many residents. For example, most of the cool tumor removal surgeries happen in academic hospitals. Therefore, many surgical oncologists and H&N ENT's end up working in academia.
 
So, let me better understand this. Academic medicine (teaching hospital position) isn't all that difficult to get into (meaning, those from lower tiered schools, with average to a bit above average stats could get them).

However, if you want a position at a teaching hospital that is a top program, then it becomes difficult for those from lower tiered med schools to get in? Am I getting this right.

And generally, you just need a MD (no PhD/MPH) to go into academic medicine.

Basically... yes. Many lower tier state medschools ARE academic medicine institutions. They teach medicine, perform clinical research, and.... honestly what else do you need? Go match at a state university. That will be academic medicine.

And no, you do not need a PhD to get in. You don't even need one to be a physician scientist and run your own lab.

Are you guys defining academic medicine differently than I am? as in some sort of additional focus? Academic medicine is just medicine performed at an academic center/teaching hospital. The term could apply less to rural programs and those not affiliated with a college of medicine or research hospital, but it still kinda fits. Academic medicine is basically just working for a university or research hospital, so you run the entire gambit in terms of competition for those programs. Some are crazy tough, others not so much.
 
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Basically... yes. Many lower tier state medschools ARE academic medicine institutions. They teach medicine, perform clinical research, and.... honestly what else do you need? Go match at a state university. That will be academic medicine.

And no, you do not need a PhD to get in. You don't even need one to be a physician scientist and run your own lab.

Are you guys defining academic medicine differently than I am? as in some sort of additional focus? Academic medicine is just medicine performed at an academic center/teaching hospital. The term could apply less to rural programs and those not affiliated with a college of medicine or research hospital, but it still kinda fits. Academic medicine is basically just working for a university or research hospital, so you run the entire gambit in terms of competition for those programs. Some are crazy tough, others not so much.
I guess I would define it as this, lol. Someone who instructs residents, works with students doing their clinical years, doing research, etc.

In general, academic medicine is considered to be more lifestyle-friendly than private practice. This is because at large academic centers, you will have residents and fellows to take call for you, take care of your inpatient post-op patients, etc. Many academic docs also have protected academic days where they do research, teach, write grants, etc., and these are generally lighter days as compared to clinic/OR.
 
I would like to add that I have noticed that the income ceiling in academia is general higher than it is in private practice. Sure, many start off making fractions of their pp counterparts, but their salary potential is significantly higher. The other day I used a search engine that reveals the salaries of state employees. I was shocked to realize that once you become a full professor, your salary will be in the north of 300K. Chiefs and chairs are paid 500-700K. In fact the chief of cardiac surgery at one school in Texas made over one million last year.

Aside from that, most of medical "cool" cases go to large academic centers. This is very appealing to many residents. For example, most of the cool tumor removal surgeries happen in academic hospitals. Therefore, many surgical oncologists and H&N ENT's end up working in academia.

Is there another kind?
 
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Why are so many med students interested in doing academic medicine, and what exactly does "academic medicine" entail? Does it pay more? Less work? Do you get to have a research lab/opportunity? I know of many medical positions that require that you also have a faculty position at a medical school that is associated with the hospital you're trying to work at, but those seem like minor commitments, and I don't think they fit into the "academic medicine" that so many med students talk about. So, for the med students here that are interested in it, I simply ask why? Do you have to come from a certain type of med school to get involved in it?

Why I'm in academic medicine-
Teaching residents and fellows. My #1 reason.
Lifestyle. One call a month vs one a week, better hours than most pp, etc.
Fair salary for hours worked. Very variable though between hospitals.
Job security.
Routine very high acuity cases. You can find this in some PP gigs as well, but generally the most challenging cases are referred to the major academic centers. My #2 reason.
Practicing cutting edge and innovative medicine. My #3. We're helping develop techniques that will become the new standard of care.
High quality surgeons. This is very import for an anesthesiologist. Especially when they're pushing the envelope.
Research opportunities, lectures, book chapters, etc.
Solid benefit package, very solid.
Ego. Not my thing, but it's absolutely a factor for some. Professor of X at Big Name Medical School.
Non clinical time for administrative involvement in departmental, hospital, school, or university activities.
Flexibility.

How easy is it to get a job here? Very difficult. We only interview the best of the best, people that trained at the strongest programs with great LORs. The surgeons are even more selective, because they grow slower than the anesthesia department has to. We hire at least one a year, but the surgeons can go years without a new hire.
Your research requirements will vary dramatically depending on both your goals and those of the department and your clinical track/appointment. Anywhere from essentially 100% clinical to 100% research time.
 
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Why I'm in academic medicine-
Teaching residents and fellows. My #1 reason.
Lifestyle. One call a month vs one a week, better hours than most pp, etc.
Fair salary for hours worked. Very variable though between hospitals.
Job security.
Routine very high acuity cases. You can find this in some PP gigs as well, but generally the most challenging cases are referred to the major academic centers. My #2 reason.
Practicing cutting edge and innovative medicine. My #3. We're helping develop techniques that will become the new standard of care.
High quality surgeons. This is very import for an anesthesiologist. Especially when they're pushing the envelope.
Research opportunities, lectures, book chapters, etc.
Solid benefit package, very solid.
Ego. Not my thing, but it's absolutely a factor for some. Professor of X at Big Name Medical School.
Non clinical time for administrative involvement in departmental, hospital, school, or university activities.
Flexibility.

How easy is it to get a job here? Very difficult. We only interview the best of the best, people that trained at the strongest programs with great LORs. The surgeons are even more selective, because they grow slower than the anesthesia department has to. We hire at least one a year, but the surgeons can go years without a new hire.
Your research requirements will vary dramatically depending on both your goals and those of the department and your clinical track/appointment. Anywhere from essentially 100% clinical to 100% research time.

I know that for physicians (and I think other employees too) of my medical institution after X-number of years they are guaranteed a pension at 65. With SS being in question and other economic factors, that is a huge benefit IMO. No idea if this is standard through academics but yeah, also the hours thing, especially for associate professors and higher.
 
K

Why I'm in academic medicine-
Teaching residents and fellows. My #1 reason.
Lifestyle. One call a month vs one a week, better hours than most pp, etc.
Fair salary for hours worked. Very variable though between hospitals.
Job security.
Routine very high acuity cases. You can find this in some PP gigs as well, but generally the most challenging cases are referred to the major academic centers. My #2 reason.
Practicing cutting edge and innovative medicine. My #3. We're helping develop techniques that will become the new standard of care.
High quality surgeons. This is very import for an anesthesiologist. Especially when they're pushing the envelope.
Research opportunities, lectures, book chapters, etc.
Solid benefit package, very solid.
Ego. Not my thing, but it's absolutely a factor for some. Professor of X at Big Name Medical School.
Non clinical time for administrative involvement in departmental, hospital, school, or university activities.
Flexibility.

How easy is it to get a job here? Very difficult. We only interview the best of the best, people that trained at the strongest programs with great LORs. The surgeons are even more selective, because they grow slower than the anesthesia department has to. We hire at least one a year, but the surgeons can go years without a new hire.
Your research requirements will vary dramatically depending on both your goals and those of the department and your clinical track/appointment. Anywhere from essentially 100% clinical to 100% research time.

My impression watching the last 2-3 years of vascular fellows going pp vs academic is that academic is an option for good residents. Don't have to be top top, but you have to be good. The BIG but is that finding a job may not be terribly difficult, it is finding a job in the city that you want, doing the kinds of cases that you want etc. If you want to pick what you want to do in academics you have to be top top.
 
I know that for physicians (and I think other employees too) of my medical institution after X-number of years they are guaranteed a pension at 65. With SS being in question and other economic factors, that is a huge benefit IMO. No idea if this is standard through academics but yeah, also the hours thing, especially for associate professors and higher.

First off, social security isn't in question, it's gone. Don't plan on it. Second, if an attending is planning on using social security for retirement, they're doing something horribly, horribly wrong in their financial planning.
 
First off, social security isn't in question, it's gone. Don't plan on it. Second, if an attending is planning on using social security for retirement, they're doing something horribly, horribly wrong in their financial planning.

Yeah, planning on either SS or a "promised" pension is foolish these days. Everyone who is at all able to do so without starving their family should plan to invest and save enough to retire and rely on that alone, since nothing is guaranteed anymore.
 
I'm not sure I'll do academic medicine, but its draw for me currently is that (as others have mentioned) you will see the most interesting cases. That's the point of tertiary (or quarternary, whatever) institutions: to take the highest acuity and undiagnosed patients. I'm particularly interested in ID, and since I'm not so keen on just taking care of osteomyelitis patients every day, academic medicine has a huge appeal to me.
 
First off, social security isn't in question, it's gone. Don't plan on it. Second, if an attending is planning on using social security for retirement, they're doing something horribly, horribly wrong in their financial planning.

What's Apples stock price going to be in 20 years?

Yeah, planning on either SS or a "promised" pension is foolish these days. Everyone who is at all able to do so without starving their family should plan to invest and save enough to retire and rely on that alone, since nothing is guaranteed anymore.

You guys realized I made a simple point about a pension program at my specific institution?...didn't know I had to write about the also saving/investing/living within your means (commonsense and not relevant to thread). Never said that a single pension or just SS would be sufficient. Someone asked about benefits at academic institutions, I gave a specific one at mine that docs seem to like. Next time Ill add footnotes about index funds and checking expense ratios :rolleyes:
 
Can we please not turn this into a political debate about SS?
 
Sorry about stepping my premed toes in here, but I'd like to know, is academic medicine an actual specialty? One that you need to match into? Like, shouldn't an attending teaching let's say cardiology have finished a residency in cardiology? In this way, isn't academic medicine more of a job title than an actual specialty?

Or the more likely scenario is that I'm just clueless, can someone explain this to me?
 
Sorry about stepping my premed toes in here, but I'd like to know, is academic medicine an actual specialty? One that you need to match into? Like, shouldn't an attending teaching let's say cardiology have finished a residency in cardiology? In this way, isn't academic medicine more of a job title than an actual specialty?

Or the more likely scenario is that I'm just clueless, can someone explain this to me?


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Academic medicine is a career path. Do you want to teach residents and fellows, do research? That's academic medicine. Though it is just a job.
 
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Sorry about stepping my premed toes in here, but I'd like to know, is academic medicine an actual specialty? One that you need to match into? Like, shouldn't an attending teaching let's say cardiology have finished a residency in cardiology? In this way, isn't academic medicine more of a job title than an actual specialty?

Or the more likely scenario is that I'm just clueless, can someone explain this to me?

Lol. :D

But good question.
 
What's Apples stock price going to be in 20 years?

You guys realized I made a simple point about a pension program at my specific institution?...didn't know I had to write about the also saving/investing/living within your means (commonsense and not relevant to thread). Never said that a single pension or just SS would be sufficient. Someone asked about benefits at academic institutions, I gave a specific one at mine that docs seem to like. Next time Ill add footnotes about index funds and checking expense ratios :rolleyes:

I made a simple expansion on what another person said, who happened to be quoting you. I wasn't intending to call you out for not reverencing every single possibly pertinent detail in your post. Try not to get so butt hurt over an internet post, you will enjoy life more :thumbup:
 
I made a simple expansion on what another person said, who happened to be quoting you. I wasn't intending to call you out for not reverencing every single possibly pertinent detail in your post. Try not to get so butt hurt over an internet post, you will enjoy life more :thumbup:

Butthurt is one word.

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I made a simple expansion on what another person said, who happened to be quoting you. I wasn't intending to call you out for not reverencing every single possibly pertinent detail in your post. Try not to get so butt hurt over an internet post, you will enjoy life more :thumbup:

Thanks for the advice champ. I'm confused though...so you are trying to call me out for "reverencing" pertinent details? Nothing like double negatives and misspellings to make a point, breh.
 
Few physician faculty spend much time teaching more than perhaps a single lecture to the medical students. It's all clinical work, research, and clinical teaching of the students, residents, and fellows. I've never given one, nor have I been asked to. Though it's not uncommon to be asked to lecture at a conference.
I'm not aware of a single one of my physician colleagues that actually are the primary instructor for a class at the medical school. Few even take the time to interview candidates, and that commitment is really minimal.
 
Is there anything that offsets the loss of income?
 
Expect to be correcting exams on your freebie nights and reading essays and stuff. Many schools can be brutal about how much time you have to upload your exam scores, some schools only give you less than 24 hours and some teachers have over 250 students because they teach in many different classrooms and perhaps more than 1 school. You are not only correcting so many exams, you also can't mix up papers from different classrooms and must upload the numbers on the database correctly or else fear the wrath of a student that is complaining about an unfair grade. Some schools have locked systems which makes it kind of hard to correct an incorrect score which is a huge hassle and a cause of stress.

This sounds nothing like American academic medicine.
 
1. Pensions: there's no such thing as a guaranteed pension anymore (I would be especially hesitant about any Illinois or California state pension).

2. The real $ in academics is being a chair or dean.

3. Residency matters much more than med school in getting an academic medicine position.

4. At many non-top tier academic institutions, it is possible to stay on as a faculty member after residency if you do well in residency.

5. The main benefit of academic internal medicine is being able to spend time sitting around and cogitating while the residents do the dirty work.
 
Few physician faculty spend much time teaching more than perhaps a single lecture to the medical students. It's all clinical work, research, and clinical teaching of the students, residents, and fellows. I've never given one, nor have I been asked to. Though it's not uncommon to be asked to lecture at a conference.
I'm not aware of a single one of my physician colleagues that actually are the primary instructor for a class at the medical school. Few even take the time to interview candidates, and that commitment is really minimal.

This.

This sounds nothing like American academic medicine.

Its not.

vasca likes to post about her experience in Mexico as if its relevant to US medicine or the vast majority of SDN users.
 
How does that compare to private practice

It is variable. And I am not sure how all of the politics works out. The dean of Hopkins is also the CEO, and I suspect that comes with a nice paycheck. I think it is largely comparable or even better depending how you look at it (in academics the hospital still pays your overhead/malpractice so you just pocket everything you make). That said, it isnt like everyone going into academics can be a chair or dean.
 
Does every chair/dean rack in research dollars/ how difficult is it to get to that level?
 
Does every chair/dean rack in research dollars/ how difficult is it to get to that level?

+1. And how many ppl who go into academic medicine actually WANT to be chairs/deans?
 
Is there anything that offsets the loss of income?

Not all academic practices pay poorly. Some have very efficient systems that strongly reward productivity, though most don't. Don't write off academic practice without doing the research yourself. It varies tremendously.
I know that I work less than some PP folks and make more, with solid benefits. Though the best PP jobs make much more. Like in PP, there are good and bad academic jobs out there. Though having said that, my job would not be ideal for someone who wants to have ~50% protected research time. It's not rocket science, the more you work the more you (usually) get paid.
 
Not all academic practices pay poorly. Some have very efficient systems that strongly reward productivity, though most don't. Don't write off academic practice without doing the research yourself. It varies tremendously.
I know that I work less than some PP folks and make more, with solid benefits. Though the best PP jobs make much more. Like in PP, there are good and bad academic jobs out there. Though having said that, my job would not be ideal for someone who wants to have ~50% protected research time. It's not rocket science, the more you work the more you (usually) get paid.

the anesthesiologists at the med school back in my home state make 475k, which is about the same as those in pp
 
wp
 
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the anesthesiologists at the med school back in my home state make 475k, which is about the same as those in pp

haha what the ****? for real? I didn't even know anesthesiologists make that loot. is that for pain?
 
gas has taken a significant Hit in salary and private practice opportunities, 475 yea 15-20 years ago maybe. Certainly not the norm. If you are making that much you are taking zero vacation. avg gas is low 300s and plummeting. I dont know anyone making that now.
 
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