What are the most difficult medical specialities that challenge drs intellectually and emotionally?

Started by mrh125
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mrh125

mrh125

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I've been thinking more and more about what I want to do in medical school and I want to seek out a speciality that challenges me both intellectually, but emotionally. I want to be pushed to my very limits, challenged, be required to learn new material constantly, and be put in difficult situations that I normally would backdown from.

What are the most difficult medical specialities that challenge drs intellectually and emotionally?
 
This is more a personal question than an objective one. Every field in medicine has challenges. Whether you are interested in those challenges and want to face them is a different question altogether.
 
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It will be different for each person. Take inventory of your qualities and read up on various specialties to attempt to answer this question.
 
Venko said:
Certainly this is unique for each person, but for me...

Neurosurgery
Emergency medicine
Pediatric oncology
Palliative medicine
Click to expand...

Pediatric oncology and Emergency medicine were definitely two I thought of.
 
I can imagine Emergency Medicine as one of them. Doctors I've shadowed basically told me they had to go through a "to do list" on each patient that visits the ED, whether it was necessary or not, or else they could be sued.
 
Pediatric oncology. The ones I used to work with had the blackest senses of humor.


mrh125 said:
I've been thinking more and more about what I want to do in medical school and I want to seek out a speciality that challenges me both intellectually, but emotionally. I want to be pushed to my very limits, challenged, be required to learn new material constantly, and be put in difficult situations that I normally would backdown from.

What are the most difficult medical specialities that challenge drs intellectually and emotionally?
Click to expand...
 
You don't know what you're asking for. Going to second pedi oncology though- I've got a heart of stone and yet it cracks a bit every shift I spend in the PICU. The saddest cases are often cancer, and oncology is about as mentally challenging as it gets.
 
Besides pediatric oncology, for me it would also be anything trauma related - like being a trauma surgeon in level 1 ER.
 
Boolean said:
EM, Ped Onc, probably most trauma and burns specialties.
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don't you just put some balm on a burn and its good to go?

Anyway, my guess would be radiology. Its challenging in that it is competitive. It is intellectually stimulating in that it involves many modalities and lots of the technology/information science. I guess its not very emotionally challenging though.
 
mrh125 said:
I've been thinking more and more about what I want to do in medical school and I want to seek out a speciality that challenges me both intellectually, but emotionally. I want to be pushed to my very limits, challenged, be required to learn new material constantly, and be put in difficult situations that I normally would backdown from.

What are the most difficult medical specialities that challenge drs intellectually and emotionally?
Click to expand...

Radiology
Radiation Oncology
Ophthalmology
Anesthesiology
Dermatology
Pathology
PM&R
 
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By the way, in theory, a burn may be emotionally difficult and reconstruction of serious burns is difficult too ... BUT I don't thin it would be that challenging intellectually. I mean, there wouldn't be any advanced diagnosis to do or figure out. Its like - this patient has a burn.

Unlike say oncology. Where even if you know it is cancer.. there is SO much still to learn about the type, biochemistry, and mechanisms of the disease. not to mention its treatment.
 
masaraksh said:
By the way, in theory, a burn may be emotionally difficult and reconstruction of serious burns is difficult too ... BUT I don't thin it would be that challenging intellectually. I mean, there wouldn't be any advanced diagnosis to do or figure out. Its like - this patient has a burn.

Unlike say oncology. Where even if you know it is cancer.. there is SO much still to learn about the type, biochemistry, and mechanisms of the disease. not to mention its treatment.
Click to expand...

This is kinda like rifle's style of trolling, minus the angle of being an overall ****ty person. There's WAY more to burns than you're implying. All thing that you suggest that make oncology interesting are relevant to burns.
 
masaraksh said:
By the way, in theory, a burn may be emotionally difficult and reconstruction of serious burns is difficult too ... BUT I don't thin it would be that challenging intellectually. I mean, there wouldn't be any advanced diagnosis to do or figure out. Its like - this patient has a burn.

Unlike say oncology. Where even if you know it is cancer.. there is SO much still to learn about the type, biochemistry, and mechanisms of the disease. not to mention its treatment.
Click to expand...

Do you actually have any experience shadowing/volunteering in a burn unit, or is this just what you imagine burn treatment is like? This is troll-level ignorance and oversimplification.

This will be my last comment though, because one premed arguing with another premed about the specifics of a medical specialty is silly. Maybe @DermViser and/or some other experienced members will chime in and enlighten you.
 
masaraksh said:
By the way, in theory, a burn may be emotionally difficult and reconstruction of serious burns is difficult too ... BUT I don't thin it would be that challenging intellectually. I mean, there wouldn't be any advanced diagnosis to do or figure out. Its like - this patient has a burn.

Unlike say oncology. Where even if you know it is cancer.. there is SO much still to learn about the type, biochemistry, and mechanisms of the disease. not to mention its treatment.
Click to expand...

Yeah, it's not like burns are different from one person to another. Nope they're all treated exactly the same. Just like all hernias are the same. All gallbladder removals are the same, etc.
 
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DermViser said:
Yeah, it's not like burns are different from one person to another. Nope they're all treated exactly the same. Just like all hernias are the same. All gallbladder removals are the same, etc.
Click to expand...
Oooo, burrrrnnnnn (sorry, couldn't resist).
 
DermViser said:
Yeah, it's not like burns are different from one person to another. Nope they're all treated exactly the same. Just like all hernias are the same. All gallbladder removals are the same, etc.
Click to expand...

Dude. All hernias ARE treated the same. You just push it back in. If it's stuck, push harder. (At least that's what I learned on Ob/Gyn, especially when that baby is herniating out the birth canal... PUSH HARDER!).
 
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