Which Foreign language should I learn?

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imperfectluck

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I'm trying to become competent in a foreign language, so I can talk to patients that can't speak English well. I really want to take French, because I already have some experience back in high school. However, I have heard that Spanish is the most useful in terms of medicine. What would you guys recommend doing?

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Dude, take French...you only live once, do what your passion is...med school wants a diverse skill set...
 
Spanish is more useful for med schools.
 
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Yup..I agree with ColonelTigh. Do what you like, learn what you like, live how you would like ;)
 
Spanish, hands down. It's VERY useful for healthcare especially where I live (AZ) I can speak Spanish almost the entire day if I choose to. Keep in mind French and Spanish are both romance languages... learning one romance language makes it MUCH easier to pick up on others. Romance languages are way similar with words often differing by a letter or two. So if you learn Spanish first, not only will it be helpful for your profession but it will also be helpful if you decide to learn French! :)
 
Yup..I agree with ColonelTigh. Do what you like, learn what you like, live how you would like ;)

I assume he'd like to be a doctor, and a good one at that. Taking Spanish will help that goal much more than taking French.
 
I assume he'd like to be a doctor, and a good one at that. Taking Spanish will help that goal much more than taking French.

Well of course. It also depends "where" he wants to work in the future.
 
I would take Spanish. But I always wanted to learn Japanese.
 
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Dude, take French...you only live once, do what your passion is...med school wants a diverse skill set...

It's not her passion. She wants to take French because she has experience with it in high school. This seems like the easy way out. I would take Spanish because you already know French. Work a different part of your brain.

I would take Latin but that's just me.
 
I'm taking French now. I took Italian also in college and French is definitely a bit harder as the pronunciation is a bit more difficult than Italian. I took Spanish all throughout high school so that's why I did not want to take it again in college but I assume that it would've been the most useful for my future.
 
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Spanish sounds best for the range of patients who speak it in medicine. However, quite a few people interested in the medical field I know have taken up with American Sign Language.
 
DON'T take Latin. It is only useful for the SAT/GRE verbal sections, and just marginally so. You will waste time reading useless orations of Caesar that are better read in translation anyway, if you're into that kinda thing. Spend time with a language that's actually spoken.

I'd take Persian. I love that language.
 
Spanish sounds best for the range of patients who speak it in medicine. However, quite a few people interested in the medical field I know have taken up with American Sign Language.
I actually want to learn sign language. Everyone else takes Spanish, so it shouldn't be that hard to find an interpreter for you.. but sign language? I bet those are much harder to come across.
 
Learn what you'd want to learn and have a passion for. However, today in the US I think it would be extremely useful to learn Spanish, also it'd be great for travelling with the vast amount of countries which speak it. In NYC currently though, after Spanish, it has become increasingly useful to know Polish or Russian (even Ukrainian though if you know Polish or Russian you can understand Ukrainian) as there has been a massive influx of immigrants from Eastern Europe in the last decade. The neighborhood next to mine which was predominately Puerto Rican and Dominican while growing up has now become little Warsaw in the span of five years.
 
I actually want to learn sign language. Everyone else takes Spanish, so it shouldn't be that hard to find an interpreter for you.. but sign language? I bet those are much harder to come across.

Nah, sign language people are everywhere. Anyone who wanted an "easy" grade in high school to fulfill their language requirements took sign language, and any school that doesn't want to deal with complaints almost has to have a few sign language interpreters on staff to travel around to various classes and interpret for deaf students. I would have no doubt that a sign language interpreter could easily be picked up. Hell, I learned quite a bit just through watching videos I rented from the library.

To the OP, I would suggest you do what you want to do, and be good at it. You'd be surprised, especially in the southern part of the country (like Louisiana, where the Cajuns and Creole's tend to be) how many people might speak French with only broken English. And when that day comes that you get a patient that only speaks French, you'll probably be one of the few people in the area that can actually help.

However, if you're looking for a language that would be USEFUL, that's going to depend on where you want to practice. For instance, the east coast has entire areas that speak mainly Russian, and Russian actually isn't that difficult of a language to pick up. Chinese has it's obvious benefits, as does Italian, Arabic, Farsi, whatever.

The point is that while Spanish will be the dominating foreign language in the medical setting, that also means that there will be an abundance of people who are available to translate. It's likely that several nurses and doctors in the hospital will even be native speakers. The people that are really going to need help are the ones who speak languages that don't come up as much. Hence, when they get sick, they have a much harder time finding someone who speaks their language than does a Spanish-speaking individual.

You can pick up Spanish over time. A lot of medical schools even teach medical Spanish as an elective. If you want to focus on a language now, I'd try to pick up proficiency in a language not many people try to carry with them, and I don't think French is a bad choice.
 
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I actually want to learn sign language. Everyone else takes Spanish, so it shouldn't be that hard to find an interpreter for you.. but sign language? I bet those are much harder to come across.

True
 
Chinese, think about it, the largest number of people in the world speak it
 
You can pick up Spanish over time. A lot of medical schools even teach medical Spanish as an elective. If you want to focus on a language now, I'd try to pick up proficiency in a language not many people try to carry with them, and I don't think French is a bad choice.

I think this is a good point. IMO, taking a class on medical Spanish in med school would help far more than taking a few semesters of beginning Spanish in undergrad. There is also the possibility of taking Spanish over the summers, if you have the time.

With that in mind, take whichever language you want. Depending on where you practice, you might use it as a doctor, or not.
 
Mongolian, because Genghis Khan spoke it and he's cool.
 
thanks guys, i might just continue learning french, and maybe pick up some spanish in medical school.
 
Chinese, think about it, the largest number of people in the world speak it

Forgot about that one, we [edit: hospital in NYC] see a lot of patients who speak Mandarin and we have very few translators or people who know it off the cuff.
 
I can't speak for your particular location but in NYC I'd say it's (in order of importance):

Spanish
Russian
Chinese
Arabic

And about 100 others, but don't bother...
 
French would be useful if you plan on living in Quebec (or France) at some point, but otherwise it's basically useless as far as clinical medicine is concerned.
 
Everyone is recommending to take spanish b/c it will be useful as a doctor since many patients might only speak spanish (or opt to only speak spanish in some cases).

If you take 10 semesters worth of a language in college will you really be able to speak fluently enough to communicate? Will you remember the second language after 4 years of med school?
 
French would be useful if you plan on living in Quebec (or France) at some point, but otherwise it's basically useless as far as clinical medicine is concerned.


and a huge chunk of Africa
 
and a huge chunk of Africa

As well, as I mentioned, a large group of people in the South, and not only "native" speakers. When I was living in Arkanas, they had like 500 French employees living there. Something to do with an airport job. Regardless, I picked up French by virtue of the fact that my French classmates needed help with translations.

As I said, Spanish is certainly not a bad language to learn, but SO MANY PEOPLE are out there learning it for exactly the reasons being stated that the need, especially in a few years, will simply not be there. I will doubt, however, that in most of the places you can work that there will be an abundance of French speakers, and the day will come when you or a fellow doctor gets a patient who speaks nothing but French.
 
If you're research oriented, Chinese would be even more helpful because so many scientists/postdocs/lab techs are Asian...
 
Learn which ever one you want. Why stop at just one? I know English (of crouse), Spanish (grew up with it), and basic dutch (not really conversational). I really want to learn Arabic and Japanese because they are so different in both their sounds and the way that they are written. Learning new languages is pretty cool if you ask me. Plus, you get automatic respect from people who are native to that language if you have taught yourself their language. :D
 
I'm trying to become competent in a foreign language, so I can talk to patients that can't speak English well. I really want to take French, because I already have some experience back in high school. However, I have heard that Spanish is the most useful in terms of medicine. What would you guys recommend doing?


I think Spanish would be the most practical, but take what you really want to take. You might kick yourself for not taking Spanish later, but let's face it, if you don't care about the language you're probably not going to learn it anyway. Also, I doubt you'll be fluent in either unless you spend some time in the country of the language of your choosing.
 
I hate when people say Spanish is more practical. **** that. Take a language that YOU will love.
 
You guys, advice me too.

I already know Russian, Turkish, English.

Everyone says I have French accent, but I live in TX.

Should I learn French or Spanish?

Heart wants French application is better with Spanish.
 
I hate when people say Spanish is more practical. **** that. Take a language that YOU will love.


When > 50% of your patients speak Spanish and not a lick of English and you're pushing the end of a 15 hour shift trying to make end of life decisions for a patient while conversing through a translator on a phone system, you should come back and let me know the impracticalities of knowing Spanish in medicine...
 
When > 50% of your patients speak Spanish and not a lick of English and you're pushing the end of a 15 hour shift trying to make end of life decisions for a patient while conversing through a translator on a phone system, you should come back and let me know the impracticalities of knowing Spanish in medicine...

This ^ x2

LOL. Seriously though, you can be all macho and say "Be yourself, learn what YOU want to learn", but look at the bigger picture. Why spend so much time learning a language like Russian for instance, when you are RARELY going to come into contact with someone else who speaks it. In other words, why learn another language just to say, "Hey I know another language," and never use it?

Now Spanish is a great language and it will be extremely useful for the rest of your life. It will take a lot of time, practice, and devotion to become fluent in a language. You might as well treat it as a life investment.

If you plan to reside in any states that border Mexico, AND you're content on learning another language, you'd be a fool not to learn Spanish.
 
I assume he'd like to be a doctor, and a good one at that. Taking Spanish will help that goal much more than taking French.

Does everything have to be about being a doctor?
 
Well, yes, considering the website you're looking at.

touché. but still. i think it's a shame when people plan all of their lives and interests around what looks good on a med school application.
 
touché. but still. i think it's a shame when people plan all of their lives and interests around what looks good on a med school application.

When i think of Spanish being useful i am not at all thinking of the med school application but beyond that.

As people have said, I think it is better to speak a language you will use often than a language which you will say you speak and almost never use (even if you are passionate about it)
 
As well, as I mentioned, a large group of people in the South, and not only "native" speakers. When I was living in Arkanas, they had like 500 French employees living there. Something to do with an airport job. Regardless, I picked up French by virtue of the fact that my French classmates needed help with translations.

As I said, Spanish is certainly not a bad language to learn, but SO MANY PEOPLE are out there learning it for exactly the reasons being stated that the need, especially in a few years, will simply not be there. I will doubt, however, that in most of the places you can work that there will be an abundance of French speakers, and the day will come when you or a fellow doctor gets a patient who speaks nothing but French.

Why do you say the need will not be there in a few years? I was actually thinking that more Mexicans would come to the U.S. over time, thus creating an even greater need for Spanish-speaking doctors.

My problem is that I just don't want to take Spanish. To me, French is a beautiful language, and I'd rather put in the time and effort to learn that language, as opposed to taking a language just because I have to know it for medical school. Also, everyone speaks Spanish. Finding a translator would be a piece of cake...but good luck trying to find any translators for the more rare languages.
 
Why do you say the need will not be there in a few years? I was actually thinking that more Mexicans would come to the U.S. over time, thus creating an even greater need for Spanish-speaking doctors.

My point wasn't that there will be less Spanish-speaking people. My point is that there will be a LOT of Spanish-speaking people. As I have said, I would be very, very surprised if there was not at least two people, whether they be nurses, doctors, or whatever working in a hospital that know Spanish.

And as time goes on, the language is going to get even more and more spread out there. My point was that by the time most of the people here are doctors, there will be so, so many Spanish speaking medical professionals out there that YOU speaking Spanish will mean essentially nothing.

And then what do you do when that French, Russian, or Arabic patient comes in, and you have a thousand clever souls who thought they were doing the world a favor by learning Spanish?

Of course Spanish is the most practical language to learn, which is why everyone is learning it. Don't feel guilty about learning a different language. When that rare patient comes by that only speaks French, and you happen to be the only doctor in the whole city that can speak French, then you're going to be very, very happy that you chose to learn a language you enjoy and leave the Spanish translations to every other doctor in the hospital.
 
No, but something as time consuming and boring as learning a new language probably should be. Why else would you do it?

Most B.A's require two years, and most B.S.'s require one.

At least at the colleges in my area.
 
Most B.A's require two years, and most B.S.'s require one.

At least at the colleges in my area.

Even better, since you have to do it, might as well make it useful.
 
Even better, since you have to do it, might as well make it useful.

Exactly. The definition of "useful" is what is being debated. No one doubts that Spanish would be a useful language. But whether or not it will be useful for the OP in a world where there will be an abundance of bilingual Spanish speakers is up to question. I think that the "usefulness" of Spanish for one individual is questionable, since, while rarer, there are people somewhere in the US that speak nothing but French and will some day need medical care.

What's the point of knowing Spanish if half the hospital knows Spanish, and that French patient comes in? That's my only point. There really is no reason NOT to take French, so long as there are enough people out there learning Spanish (or, if they are native speakers, English).
 
touché. but still. i think it's a shame when people plan all of their lives and interests around what looks good on a med school application.

that's the name of the game. I wish I had focused on what looks good on a med school application instead of taking classes like modern physics which med schools don't particularly care about, but I thoroughly enjoyed...
 
I'm taking Spanish right now. So obviously I would say take Spanish if you plan on being an MD in the US.

French is a dying language. It used to be the language of diplomacy, but no more.
 
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