I found a great article today while doing my daily reading. It’s entitled 7 Reasons to Quit Your Job, but can definitely be applied to why you should quit your residency. After all, isn’t residency basically just a very, very low paying job?
His story is very similar to mine as to how he got started with his business.
This is an incredible article about the value of entrepreneurship. The problem with this is that physicians do not want to hear, know, or deal with this issue. Almost all of our medical problems would be solved if physicians simply worked as small business owners and quit seeking the paycheck and embodying the idea of “safe secure job.” I have tried and tried to no avail to convince my school to have some sort of business training. I’ve tried to start a business organization, bring electives to the school, and get guest speakers. However each time I’ve been wholeheartedly rejected in my attempts. And the more physicians bury their heads in the sand regarding this issue, the more they’ll get trampled by those who don’t.
Keep at it Ryan, and remember that if your school continues to reject your ideas for business awareness, you will still succeed as an entrepreneur if that’s what you want to do. It’s great that you see the importance of business, since many students don’t know or even care about this.
Hey Hoover, this comment isn’t directed toward this particular article. Rather, I’m simply commenting on the site. I wandered on to your site today and my jaw kind of hit the floor. Because after sifting through the posts on here I realized I was looking into a mirror. If I had ever started a blog it would be just like yours with similar articles and feelings (maybe not as neatly organized).
About junior year into medical school I also realized I didn’t like anything. Oh, if you asked me what specialties I didn’t want to do I’d have spit out my answers like pediatrics and Ob/Gyn in a millisecond. Had you asked me what I was interested in though, I probably would have just given you a blank stare.
Anyways, last year I tried to escape my plight by applying for EM but I didn’t match. So after sitting out a year I find out I’m now set to begin medicine come July. But you want to know the problem? I hated my medicine core and sub-internship. I expect things to be exponentially worse in residency. I often thought about quitting during 4th year of medical school but I’m one of the 50% you mentioned in one of your other posts. I’m too old and owe too much money.
I guess it’s time for me to get the Paxil and Zoloft ready. I hope lots of undecided pre-meds see your site before they take the plunge because it really is very difficult to turn the ship around.
LifeSucks,
If you’re interested, send me an email about writing some stuff for MSH.
I think, like LifeSucks, that the vast majority of people who pursue a career in medicine do not adequately think it through before embarking. Even as a resident in an “easy” specialty, such as pathology, I routinely work over 80 hours, close to everyday of the week. I think your website is a very accurate description of what medical school is like. In my experience, medical school was a complete joke. Granted, I did put in a substantial amount of time. But nonetheless, it was “easy”.
Residency, on the other hand, is a completely different beast altogether. I would go as far to say that comparing medical school and residency is like comparing apples and oranges. Residency is basically medical school with scut work attached. You are expected to maintain and demonstrate an increase in fund of knowledge while performing substantial amounts of “service” work.
In my view, the sacrifice is not worth it. You give up a lot of your youth and have to delay a lot of things, such as getting married and starting a family. In addition, you give up making an income for a long time. Granted physicians may make more than the average person per year, but one has to take into account that the income is earned in a more compressed time period, meaning higher income taxes and less money earned.
I’ve devoted a lot of time to this “career” with nothing to show for it. My patience is starting to wear thin now. I’m in a substantial amount of debt, I am still single with limited time for dating. This crap is not worth it. If I could get out and find a non medical related career that would pay around 100k, I would do it in heartbeat. Oh well, I guess all of us are sado-masochists in some fashion.
Hi,
So MedicineSucks, are you a resident at the moment? And what country are you in?
I am a second year medical student, 19yrs old, and about 20,000 New Zealand dollars in debt to the government (student loan). I have suddenly realised that I did not give “adequate thought” as to whether to pursue medicine or not, partly because my first year was competitive for medicine entrance, so i had to be focussed on getting in. When I finished school i was really interested in arts, and now that feeling is coming back and sometimes I want to jump off the boat and swim over to law and a BA. However I feel those subjects arent as worthwhile, because I know I can help people with medicine, on the flipside though, I know I would love to study those subjects. I enjoy medicine at the moment, but there is definately the possibility I would enjoy another path just as much or more. Do you think that I should take into account the increased workloads when being a junior doctor? And are there any specialities that are better suited to having a more balanced lifetsyle (excluding GP because I am not interested in that at this stage)? Also, naive question ahead: what does a pathologist DO in the hospital?
Thankyou
LifeSucks says:
March 31, 2008 at 11:25 pm
Hey Hoover, this comment isn’t directed toward this particular article. Rather, I’m simply commenting on the site. I wandered on to your site today and my jaw kind of hit the floor. Because after sifting through the posts on here I realized I was looking into a mirror. If I had ever started a blog it would be just like yours with similar articles and feelings (maybe not as neatly organized).
About junior year into medical school I also realized I didn’t like anything. Oh, if you asked me what specialties I didn’t want to do I’d have spit out my answers like pediatrics and Ob/Gyn in a millisecond. Had you asked me what I was interested in though, I probably would have just given you a blank stare.
Anyways, last year I tried to escape my plight by applying for EM but I didn’t match. So after sitting out a year I find out I’m now set to begin medicine come July. But you want to know the problem? I hated my medicine core and sub-internship. I expect things to be exponentially worse in residency. I often thought about quitting during 4th year of medical school but I’m one of the 50% you mentioned in one of your other posts. I’m too old and owe too much money.
I guess it’s time for me to get the Paxil and Zoloft ready. I hope lots of undecided pre-meds see your site before they take the plunge because it really is very difficult to turn the ship around.