Why not become a doctor for the money?

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jaykav07

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I didn't know where to put this thread, you can move it if you feel necessary. So I heard that becoming a doctor for the money is not worth the effort, but is this really true? I mean the effort in getting a job with 150k+ salary is very difficult if you are going into other fields.

I've finished my undergrad and my only options are either to go to the carribean next semester or go to grad school and then to med school, which just seems to stretch the time to becoming a doctor to ridiculous lengths. I've never really enjoyed medicine, but when looking at other career paths, I've found that I primarily look at what the salary would be. Becoming a doctor would take 7 more years of schooling including residency, and going back to school to follow another career path would take a similar amount of time, but I would get a lower salary. If I were to get an MBA for example, that would take 4+ years of more schooling plus 3 years of work experience, and the starting salary is like 112k... from HARVARD.
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You don't have to have pa**sion for medicine to go into it. If you know what to expect (which pre-meds really can't know) and have a marginal interest in the science behind it you can still do just fine I believe.
 
By the time you factor in all of the time it takes for school and training, and the huge debt load you'd have after graduating, medicine is not the money machine you'd think it is. So if you're in it for the money and don't love the work, it's not a great bargain.

There are lots of other ways to make $150K+ if you're smart and good at your job. The most successful business people make much more than that in many fields with bachelors or masters degrees.
 
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looking forward to going to work in the AM >>> salary;

finding a career that combines the above two = jackpot
 
DokterMom said:
By the time you factor in all of the time it takes for school and training, and the huge debt load you'd have after graduating, medicine is not the money machine you'd think it is. So if you're in it for the money and don't love the work, it's not a great bargain.

There are lots of other ways to make $150K+ if you're smart and good at your job. The most successful business people make much more than that in many fields with bachelors or masters degrees.
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Sure the "most successful" business people are banking, but no one ever talks about the average business person. You say medicine is a bad bargain, but if I go back to school to do something else, I really don't know if I would make over 150k, maybe I would be one of the average ones and make >100k. As a doctor you are guaranteed to make over 100k.

And going back to school to follow another career path wouldn't be cheap either.
 
jaykav07 said:
Sure the "most successful" business people are banking, but no one ever talks about the average business person. You say medicine is a bad bargain, but if I go back to school to do something else, I really don't know if I would make over 150k, maybe I would be one of the average ones and make >100k. As a doctor you are guaranteed to make over 100k.

And going back to school to follow another career path wouldn't be cheap either.
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You can say the same about medicine. Not everybody will get into medical school, the person who gets in is generally above average. Most people will drop out before they even submit their application and of those, about 50% won't make it. In another career, you'll get a lower salary, in medicine, you get nothing if you fail to make it in to medical school (which is a fairly tough road).
 
1) Have you never heard of Obamacare and how physicians salaries will most likely drop in addition to more stressful work conditions???? I don't follow politics even in the slightest yet I know this.

2) Becoming a doctor is extremely difficult and if you're motivation is money, you will be miserable. So if you're okay with being miserable as long as you have money... Then sure! By all means, apply to medical school!

3) You will screw yourself over if you go to medical school in the Caribbean. Bottom line. It is a terrible idea for several reasons that have been discussed ad nauseum on this forum.

The fact that you are clearly in it for the money and that you want to go to med school in the Caribbean shows that you will likely choose a different profession if you have half a brain.
 
TheShaker said:
You can say the same about medicine. Not everybody will get into medical school, the person who gets in is generally above average. Most people will drop out before they even submit their application and of those, about 50% won't make it. In another career, you'll get a lower salary, in medicine, you get nothing if you fail to make it in to medical school (which is a fairly tough road).
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There are fallbacks in both routes, if you completely fail at going to med school you can work as a lab tech. If you fail at getting an MBA you'll still have some marketing/finance job. To make it big in business you have to be the best of the best, something arguably comparable to making it through med school/residency.
 
jaykav07 said:
I didn't know where to put this thread, you can move it if you feel necessary. So I heard that becoming a doctor for the money is not worth the effort, but is this really true? I mean the effort in getting a job with 150k+ salary is very difficult if you are going into other fields.

I've finished my undergrad and my only options are either to go to the carribean next semester or go to grad school and then to med school, which just seems to stretch the time to becoming a doctor to ridiculous lengths. I've never really enjoyed medicine, but when looking at other career paths, I've found that I primarily look at what the salary would be. Becoming a doctor would take 6 more years of schooling including residency, and going back to school to follow another career path would take a similar amount of time, but I would get a lower salary. If I were to get an MBA for example, that would take at least 4 years of more schooling and the starting salary is like 112k... from HARVARD.
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Depending on your ability to finance a medical education you wont just be getting a 150k+ salary. You will be getting a 150k+ salary with 200k+ in principle debt with 8+ years of accrued interest.

Yes, you will be paid well eventually but you wont really feel the change in lifestyle that comes with a 150k+ salary until several years into your career ~ 18 years post college education (4 years med school + 4 years residency + 10 year repayment).

When you compare salaries you really need to look at the net take home pay. 150k compared to 112k seems like a large discrepancy, but after taxes for the state of Alabama its a comparison of 8,100/month to 6,200/month respectively.
 
BenzylAcetate said:
Depending on your ability to finance a medical education you wont just be getting a 150k+ salary. You will be getting a 150k+ salary with 200k+ in principle debt with 8+ years of accrued interest.

Yes, you will be paid well eventually but you wont really feel the change in lifestyle that comes with a 150k+ salary until several years into your career ~ 18 years post college education (4 years med school + 4 years residency + 10 year repayment).

When you compare salaries you really need to look at the net take home pay. 150k compared to 112k seems like a large discrepancy, but after taxes for the state of Alabama its a comparison of 8,100/month to 6,200/month respectively.
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In both cases I would have 4 more years of schooling though so I would really have debt both ways, so that argument is null. Though with medicine there is 3 years of residency after schooling, but you don't have to pay for it. And that 112k salary is from harvard, that's the best case scenario.

EDIT: Getting an MBA takes 2 years to get a new degree, 3 years of work experience, and 2 more years at business school. Overall 7 years.
 
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Agent B said:
Well, that shot down his argument. I'm interested to see what you and other residents/attendings have to say in this matter.
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Medical school is largely memorization and book-work. The exams ensure that you have the minimal requisite knowledge to graduate. That's all that matters because 'everyone' goes on for additional specialty training.

Once you reach residency, you are largely left on your own to learn the material. No one holds your hand or forces you to learn how to care for your patients. You will need to have the self-motivation to learn for the sake of your patients and your own passion for the material. There are exams in residency, but they are few and far between, and only scratch the surface of what you need to know to become a good physician.
 
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jaykav07 said:
I didn't know where to put this thread, you can move it if you feel necessary. So I heard that becoming a doctor for the money is not worth the effort, but is this really true? I mean the effort in getting a job with 150k+ salary is very difficult if you are going into other fields.

I've finished my undergrad and my only options are either to go to the carribean next semester or go to grad school and then to med school, which just seems to stretch the time to becoming a doctor to ridiculous lengths. I've never really enjoyed medicine, but when looking at other career paths, I've found that I primarily look at what the salary would be. Becoming a doctor would take 7 more years of schooling including residency, and going back to school to follow another career path would take a similar amount of time, but I would get a lower salary. If I were to get an MBA for example, that would take 4+ years of more schooling and the starting salary is like 112k... from HARVARD.
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Don't wanna be mean, but if you only care about money, why the caribbean(which would have a higher change of making you LOSE money....)?

And are you sure you can actually come close to getting into Harvard? :O

If you really do decide medicine, the grad school ----> med school would be the preferred method. I don't see why you can't try next cycle(unless grades are a factor).
 
Nothing wrong with going into medicine for the money IMO as long as you can still be a good doctor.
 
You could do it, but I imagine you're gonna have a bad time.

As it is there are a lot of people who go into medicine because they legitimately enjoy it and even they get burned out dealing with all the **** and stress that you'll have to put up with in a medical career. Seems to me that when there are many out there who like medicine and still are on the fence about whether the years of training, stress, debt, and sacrifice are worth it, you would be foolish to go into it knowing that it's not something you enjoy. When you're six years into training you don't like for a job you won't enjoy, sitting in the hospital at 3 AM on call dealing with non-compliant patients trying to die on you, you'll look back at this comparison of finances and realize you've probably made a big mistake.


Attendings/residents/med students please correct me.
 
Why do people attack someone who asks a question. Money is not a bad reason to do this. My passion truly is in having passionate wild orgies, eating food, and playing video games. Hard to find someone that will pay me a six figure salary for this. If you know what the medical career holds and how hard it is to get through it you will be fine. Coming previously from the business world I can tell you it's not relatively easy to make 150k+ and having a wife in IT with 10+ years experience she still hasn't broken six figures.

Every resident and attending on this forum thinks if they hadn't gone into medicine they would be a football playing space astronaut king. It isn't that easy out there. Even with obamacare going through we won't be getting 80k. If we do people will drop out and supply and demand will kick in and things will stabilize again.

For an investment of 4 yrs of med school and 3 yr residency a 150k salary is a good deal. For comparison at a consulting company after seven years you would be at most a manager making 90 to 100. If you think you would get into a masters program at Wharton and make 150, good luck getting in. More competitive than medical school considering that the real benefit of an MBA comes from going to one of the top 10. They're are fewer combined slots than in med school.

Also just to be clear strategic management consulting also has its own pitfalls of long hours, stress, and need to perform.

So in summary for the time invested medicine is a good investment with a stable return.
 
jaykav07 said:
Sure the "most successful" business people are banking, but no one ever talks about the average business person. You say medicine is a bad bargain, but if I go back to school to do something else, I really don't know if I would make over 150k, maybe I would be one of the average ones and make >100k. As a doctor you are guaranteed to make over 100k.

And going back to school to follow another career path wouldn't be cheap either.
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Compound that with the fact that medicine does well regardless of the economy. I really can't wrap my head around people saying going into medicine is a huge sacrifice. They must be lying to themselves or are trying to dissuade potential competition, ha.
 
SeekerOfTheTree said:
Why do people attack someone who asks a question. Money is not a bad reason to do this. My passion truly is in having passionate wild orgies, eating food, and playing video games. Hard to find someone that will pay me a six figure salary for this. If you know what the medical career holds and how hard it is to get through it you will be fine. Coming previously from the business world I can tell you it's not relatively easy to make 150k+ and having a wife in IT with 10+ years experience she still hasn't broken six figures.

Every resident and attending on this forum thinks if they hadn't gone into medicine they would be a football playing space astronaut king. It isn't that easy out there. Even with obamacare going through we won't be getting 80k. If we do people will drop out and supply and demand will kick in and things will stabilize again.

For an investment of 4 yrs of med school and 3 yr residency a 150k salary is a good deal. For comparison at a consulting company after seven years you would be at most a manager making 90 to 100. If you think you would get into a masters program at Wharton and make 150, good luck getting in. More competitive than medical school considering that the real benefit of an MBA comes from going to one of the top 10. They're are fewer combined slots than in med school.

Also just to be clear strategic management consulting also has its own pitfalls of long hours, stress, and need to perform.

So in summary for the time invested medicine is a good investment with a stable return.
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:thumbup:
Real talk. And from someone with the experience to back it up as well--nice to see. You never hear about a physician losing her job unless its scandal-related. With a business degree you are one of the first people to go when things get rough.
 
SeekerOfTheTree said:
Why do people attack someone who asks a question. Money is not a bad reason to do this. My passion truly is in having passionate wild orgies, eating food, and playing video games. Hard to find someone that will pay me a six figure salary for this. If you know what the medical career holds and how hard it is to get through it you will be fine. Coming previously from the business world I can tell you it's not relatively easy to make 150k+ and having a wife in IT with 10+ years experience she still hasn't broken six figures.

Every resident and attending on this forum thinks if they hadn't gone into medicine they would be a football playing space astronaut king. It isn't that easy out there. Even with obamacare going through we won't be getting 80k. If we do people will drop out and supply and demand will kick in and things will stabilize again.

For an investment of 4 yrs of med school and 3 yr residency a 150k salary is a good deal. For comparison at a consulting company after seven years you would be at most a manager making 90 to 100. If you think you would get into a masters program at Wharton and make 150, good luck getting in. More competitive than medical school considering that the real benefit of an MBA comes from going to one of the top 10. They're are fewer combined slots than in med school.

Also just to be clear strategic management consulting also has its own pitfalls of long hours, stress, and need to perform.

So in summary for the time invested medicine is a good investment with a stable return.
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Not to mention boring as hell. Business seems to be a venue that people mention to be successful..however they neglect to realize not everyone would like it. I know I would poke my eyeballs out, fall asleep at work everyday, roll my eyes at any finance, banking, accounting discussions, etc.

I don't think it's bad for someone to choose medicine for the money, as long as they aware of all the aspects of the profession.
 
If you want to only make money, dont be a physician. If you have what it takes to become a doctor, you obviously can do well in another profession. And many im sure make a whole lot more money. Making money is easy if thats all you want to do, and will do anything to get it. Frankly thats not something that appeals me.
 
mcloaf said:
You could do it, but I imagine you're gonna have a bad time.

As it is there are a lot of people who go into medicine because they legitimately enjoy it and even they get burned out dealing with all the **** and stress....
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I am sorry I have to disagree. Alot of people claim they go into it because they love it. Going through medical school you kind of see true motivations come out. People that initially wanted to go into primary care all of a sudden decide derm is right for them after they get their scores back. There are other fields that are equally rewarding with less reimbursement; however, they don't get anywhere near the caliber of med student applicants or the numbers. Could salary be a motivator? Maybe a little.

People do burnout in medicine. What do you think happens on other careers? Medicine isn't the only high stress field. Great rewards require high stress. It becomes a job after awhile regardless of what you do and if you work too hard you burnout.
 
SeekerOfTheTree said:
People do burnout in medicine. What do you think happens on other careers? Medicine isn't the only high stress field. Great rewards require high stress. It becomes a job after awhile regardless of what you do and if you work too hard you burnout.
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You are out of your mind if you think the amount of stress felt in most other careers comes even close to that in medicine. Wait till you have to explain a patients death to a family member who blames you for killing their husband/daughter/son (whether it truly was your fault or not). And wait till you feel the stress of wondering with every decision you make whether it will lead to serious harm coming to a patient (and sometimes it will). Now try worrying about making a mistake or missing something with the hospital administration scheduling you a patient to see every 10 minutes. And the way medicine is changing with ACA, all physicians will be a hospital employee by the time your are done with residency or fellowship and you will be paid far less while working harder.

Remember when you hear politicians and hospitals talk about making medicine more "efficient" they mean making you see more patients, more quickly (as if it the number of patients we have to see per day wasn't already ridiculous), and no, they don't care if it leads to you making more mistakes -- that's still your fault, not theirs.
 
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Dusn said:
You are out of your mind if you think the amount of stress felt in most other careers comes even close to that in medicine. Wait till you have to explain a patients death to a family member who blames you for killing their husband/daughter/son (whether it truly was your fault or not). And wait till you feel the stress of wondering with every decision you make whether it will lead to serious harm coming to a patient (and sometimes it will). Now try worrying about making a mistake or missing something with the hospital administration scheduling you a patient to see every 10 minutes. And the way medicine is changing with ACA, all physicians will be a hospital employee by the time your are done with residency or fellowship and you will be paid far less while working harder.

Remember when you hear politicians and hospitals talk about making medicine more "efficient" they mean making you see more patients, more quickly (as if it the number of patients we have to see per day wasn't already ridiculous), and no, they don't care if it leads to you making more mistakes -- that's still your fault, not theirs.
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Yes yes I am out of my mind. The sky is falling. Medicine is reserved for the elite few that have true passion and love delivering bad news to patient families. Yup you are right man. Everyone else will burnout. Damn the government and everyone else. All these changes are going to cause all of us to go crazy and we will all quit and become CEOs. EMR is bad, hospital employment is bad. Damn you Kaiser! No one else's career has the stress we do. Our burden is the heaviest.

It's a job. Relax.
 
The point was people burnout. Medicine isn't special to that. There isn't this special amount of untapped stress that only physicians feel that no other brain in the world experiences. Only we know that special third whole of stress that's visible under moonlight. People process stress and situations can be stressful to people whether they are telling someone their dad is dead or diffusing a bomb on the side of the road or getting laid by a prostitute for the order time.

The whole follow your passion bull doesn't always pay the bills.
 
jaykav07 said:
I didn't know where to put this thread, you can move it if you feel necessary. So I heard that becoming a doctor for the money is not worth the effort, but is this really true? I mean the effort in getting a job with 150k+ salary is very difficult if you are going into other fields.

I've finished my undergrad and my only options are either to go to the carribean next semester or go to grad school and then to med school, which just seems to stretch the time to becoming a doctor to ridiculous lengths. I've never really enjoyed medicine, but when looking at other career paths, I've found that I primarily look at what the salary would be. Becoming a doctor would take 7 more years of schooling including residency, and going back to school to follow another career path would take a similar amount of time, but I would get a lower salary. If I were to get an MBA for example, that would take 4+ years of more schooling and the starting salary is like 112k... from HARVARD.
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You realize if you go to a Caribbean medical school by the time you graduate the residency programs will be filled by american grads and there won't be left over residencies for Caribbean medical school graduates. If by chance you do get a residency spot it will be some crappy FP position which you can barely make over 120k from in this environment, after you graduate from residency. By then new FPs will be competing with NPs and PAs for the same jobs. Overall I think it's a pretty dumb idea to go into medicine purely for the money. It's even more ******ed to go to a Caribbean school for the money. Essentially you'll end up with a big loan, without a residency, and you'll be living your life with educational loans that you can't repay or declare bankruptcy on.
 
Going to the carribeans is stupid i agree with that.

Family paying 120 and being replaced? 3rd year resident I knew got a 200k offer and 50k reimbursement in loans. Family med forum gives a more realistic perspective on the salaries. Locum work can be made into a career and you can make close to 300k.

Strippers make good money.
 
Feel free to join a similar conversation in the non-trad forums. Thread was called A different point of view.
 
SeekerOfTheTree said:
Going to the carribeans is stupid i agree with that.

Family paying 120 and being replaced? 3rd year resident I knew got a 200k offer and 50k reimbursement in loans. Family med forum gives a more realistic perspective on the salaries. Locum work can be made into a career and you can make close to 300k.

Strippers make good money.
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That won't be the case in 2020. By then PA and NPs will have more autonomy and will be hired by clinics instead of FPs. Also I know many more 3rd year FP residents than you that aren't getting those kinds of offers even now. IM may be able to pull over 150 if they work like a resident. But FP residents are not getting the hospitalist jobs IM residents are.

And here's the first thread I saw when I browsed their forum:
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=987647
 
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Agent B said:
Well, that shot down his argument. I'm interested to see what you and other residents/attendings have to say in this matter.
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Fine. I don't have a "passion for medicine", nor do I consider it a "calling", personally.

It's an interesting career. It's something for which I have an aptitude (as opposed for finance, for which I have zero, for ex), and a field I enjoy, both the science and the personal interaction. I won't be buying private jets, but I enjoy financial stability.

I decided to go to medicine in my 2nd year of undergrad. I was in a pre-med type program because I was always going to do something biosci-related (there's that aptitude thing), but I didn't come out of the womb dreaming of a stethoscope around my neck. I never shadowed a physician in my life; it's not that common in Canada anyways.

Medicine is an interesting career overall, yes. But it's not continually stressful; it's not even continually interesting. Of course it gets routine once you're past your initial training and settle into working at your job day in and day out.
 
SeekerOfTheTree said:
Why do people attack someone who asks a question.
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This discussion has actually been pretty docile to the OP compared to most.

SeekerOfTheTree said:
Money is not a bad reason to do this. My passion truly is in having passionate wild orgies, eating food, and playing video games. Hard to find someone that will pay me a six figure salary for this.
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It appears you took the statement a bit too literally

SeekerOfTheTree said:
If you know what the medical career holds and how hard it is to get through it you will be fine.
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You haven't gotten to the hard part yet. You may feel differently once you're in the thick of residency.
 
Because there is none. It's a guarantee to an upper-middle-class life, but's it's by no means a guarantee to make it rich.
 
Because when the 80th hour rolls around when you're on-call after working 23 hours straight, and you're 200,000k in debt and 30 years old barely making minimum wage, you're probably going to regret your decision.
 
stems said:
That won't be the case in 2020. By then PA and NPs will have more autonomy and will be hired by clinics instead of FPs. Also I know many more 3rd year FP residents than you that aren't getting those kinds of offers even now. IM may be able to pull over 150 if they work like a resident. But FP residents are not getting the hospitalist jobs IM residents are.

And here's the first thread I saw when I browsed their forum:
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=987647
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You see the same doom and gloom on path, radiology, anesthesia, EM, Derm, etc. name the field. Go look on the salary forum of FM and see what the offers are.

I wish I had the crystal ball to tell you what will happen in 2020. Buy let me take a guess based on what these forums say. Anesthesia and radiology will be gone. Replaced by CrNA and telerads. Watson will be the new Primary care doc. Surgery will be automated and done by algorithms in the Davinci machines.

My FM friends are obviously better than your FM friends lol.

IM= hospitalists=7 on 7 off=200k.
 
thesauce said:
This discussion has actually been pretty docile to the OP compared to most.



It appears you took the statement a bit too literally



You haven't gotten to the hard part yet. You may feel differently once you're in the thick of residency.
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Everything in life is hard. Residency will jade me and I will be bitter. Sure. Medical school was suppose to be my rape with a fire hose and I thought it was easy. Stuff isn't that hard. I recommend people do a second career before they decide to do medicine. Life is life. A job is a job. Just suck it up do it. Come home and chill. You guys make this your life that's why it's so disappointing to you when it doesn't go the way you guys hoped. Majority of the residents I have met have my view. Maybe the people I know are a happier bunch.
 
SeekerOfTheTree said:
You see the same doom and gloom on path, radiology, anesthesia, EM, Derm, etc. name the field. Go look on the salary forum of FM and see what the offers are.

I wish I had the crystal ball to tell you what will happen in 2020. Buy let me take a guess based on what these forums say. Anesthesia and radiology will be gone. Replaced by CrNA and telerads. Watson will be the new Primary care doc. Surgery will be automated and done by algorithms in the Davinci machines.

My FM friends are obviously better than your FM friends lol.

IM= hospitalists=7 on 7 off=200k.
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IM = Being treated like and working like a resident for the rest of your life. Not my cup of tea.

I always just dump my social patients on IM attendings. All they do is take care of the social issues while the specialists do the work. I don't have anything against them but I would definitely say it's neither a good job nor rewarding career.
 
:thumbup:
EnergyDrink said:
Because when the 80th hour rolls around when you're on-call after working 23 hours straight, and you're 200,000k in debt and 30 years old barely making minimum wage, you're probably going to regret your decision.
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ScholarStud said:
Compound that with the fact that medicine does well regardless of the economy. I really can't wrap my head around people saying going into medicine is a huge sacrifice. They must be lying to themselves or are trying to dissuade potential competition, ha.
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The lack of perspective is nearly palpable.
 
stems said:
IM = Being treated like and working like a resident for the rest of your life. Not my cup of tea.

I always just dump my social patients on IM attendings. All they do is take care of the social issues while the specialists do the work. I don't have anything against them but I would definitely say it's neither a good job nor rewarding career.
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Lol okay man.
 
jaykav07 said:
I didn't know where to put this thread, you can move it if you feel necessary. So I heard that becoming a doctor for the money is not worth the effort, but is this really true? I mean the effort in getting a job with 150k+ salary is very difficult if you are going into other fields.

I've finished my undergrad and my only options are either to go to the carribean next semester or go to grad school and then to med school, which just seems to stretch the time to becoming a doctor to ridiculous lengths. I've never really enjoyed medicine, but when looking at other career paths, I've found that I primarily look at what the salary would be. Becoming a doctor would take 7 more years of schooling including residency, and going back to school to follow another career path would take a similar amount of time, but I would get a lower salary. If I were to get an MBA for example, that would take 4+ years of more schooling and the starting salary is like 112k... from HARVARD.
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It is true that it takes more effort to be in medicine than back in the good ol' days (this is what I have gotten from family friends who are physicians). However, compared to the job market of "most professions" the outlook of medicine is still better (even if it is getting worse).


TheShaker said:
You can say the same about medicine. Not everybody will get into medical school, the person who gets in is generally above average. Most people will drop out before they even submit their application and of those, about 50% won't make it. In another career, you'll get a lower salary, in medicine, you get nothing if you fail to make it in to medical school (which is a fairly tough road).
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Right but you have to remember that it is better that the bar is set higher earlier in the game than later. Would you rather be the person rejected into medical school after getting a baccalaureate degree? Or would you rather be the post-doc not able to find research position at a university or private company and then give up all together (this is were most PhDs are weeded out)? Remember that in both scenarios neither won't be able to get the job that they want. However, one will not feel the pain that much and the other will realize that he/she wasted 7 years of education for nothing.

Dusn said:
You are out of your mind if you think the amount of stress felt in most other careers comes even close to that in medicine. Wait till you have to explain a patients death to a family member who blames you for killing their husband/daughter/son (whether it truly was your fault or not). And wait till you feel the stress of wondering with every decision you make whether it will lead to serious harm coming to a patient (and sometimes it will). Now try worrying about making a mistake or missing something with the hospital administration scheduling you a patient to see every 10 minutes. And the way medicine is changing with ACA, all physicians will be a hospital employee by the time your are done with residency or fellowship and you will be paid far less while working harder.

Remember when you hear politicians and hospitals talk about making medicine more "efficient" they mean making you see more patients, more quickly (as if it the number of patients we have to see per day wasn't already ridiculous), and no, they don't care if it leads to you making more mistakes -- that's still your fault, not theirs.
Click to expand...

I hope to god that doctors will unionize one day and those politicians will clean up their act because of the threat of a physicians' strike.
 
What is with all of these threads where people feel like they have to defend their reasons for going into medicine? Go into it for whatever reason you want, and stop caring so much what other people think.
 
thesauce said:
Medical school is largely memorization and book-work. The exams ensure that you have the minimal requisite knowledge to graduate. That's all that matters because 'everyone' goes on for additional specialty training.

Once you reach residency, you are largely left on your own to learn the material. No one holds your hand or forces you to learn how to care for your patients. You will need to have the self-motivation to learn for the sake of your patients and your own passion for the material. There are exams in residency, but they are few and far between, and only scratch the surface of what you need to know to become a good physician.
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O2Doc said:
Fine. I don't have a "passion for medicine", nor do I consider it a "calling", personally.

It's an interesting career. It's something for which I have an aptitude (as opposed for finance, for which I have zero, for ex), and a field I enjoy, both the science and the personal interaction. I won't be buying private jets, but I enjoy financial stability.

I decided to go to medicine in my 2nd year of undergrad. I was in a pre-med type program because I was always going to do something biosci-related (there's that aptitude thing), but I didn't come out of the womb dreaming of a stethoscope around my neck. I never shadowed a physician in my life; it's not that common in Canada anyways.

Medicine is an interesting career overall, yes. But it's not continually stressful; it's not even continually interesting. Of course it gets routine once you're past your initial training and settle into working at your job day in and day out.
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Thanks for your insight. :thumbup:
 
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