Medicine Is Serious Business

Hoover  10 May, 2008  Medical School, The Wards

15 Comments so far »

1. disaffected student said

   May 10 2008 @ 11:48 am

   How the hell are you getting away with only 150k in tuition with living expenses…? I think amongst my classmates the average is 250k and above

2. Hoover said

   May 10 2008 @ 1:44 pm

   “Affordable” schools?

3. Half M.D. said

   May 11 2008 @ 8:39 pm

   Today was my off day on the ob/gyn service. That means I have to play catch-up by doing patient write-ups and begging to get a weekend off so that I can attend a conference. Yep, medicine is serious business.

4. jawnyg said

   May 12 2008 @ 2:00 pm

   Great site! Looking for advice. I am 30, have a BS and an MS in engineering with not so good grades for med school (below the 3.5 suggested in other threads), and I want to go into medicine, mainly Osteopathic. I have had plenty of time in labs, reading journals and writing (I wrote 150 page thesis on water chemistry statistics), and I have a very diverse background in teaching kids music and volunteering. Now, I realized how rewarding a job in medicine would be after having my soul sucked away by engineering. There is an osteopathic school in my home town and I have always believed in the “whole person” approach to helping people after speaking with many of the students. Money aside… I can buy what ever I want, go anywhere I want anytime but I am still lacking any reward in life and miss helping people that need it. Any advice for getting into med school? Another degree to bring the GPA up? Just supplement classes?

5. Eh? said

   May 12 2008 @ 3:01 pm

   jawnyg,

   you sound like all the other poor sap premeds on studentdoctor.net. Maybe go over there and see what you can dig up. I have this, I have that, I RULE! let me into med school…i am altruistic and I believe in healing the person as a “whole”. Are you kidding me? If you haven’t already noticed…the site reads med school hell…not how do I look so good that all med schools want me…get real.

6. jawnyg said

   May 12 2008 @ 3:37 pm

   I was just fishing in hell to see get the whole picture of medicine. Heaven/hell/Purgatory… it is good to get all sides. Also I have noticed comments and posts from people that actually like what they are doing.

   Eh?
   “the site reads med school hell…not how do I look so good that all med schools want me…get real.”

   http://www.medschoolhell.com/2007/05/21/medical-school-requirements/

   Are you kidding me?

7. Sabathius said

   May 12 2008 @ 4:40 pm

   Re: I’m paying $150,000 in tuition for four years (including living expenses) so I can come into work for 12 hours on Saturday. God, I rule.
   —

   I couldn’t stop laughing when I read this. Really made my day hahhaha. I just declined an offer for teachers college (after, you know 10 years post secondary education and flasely thinking that I enjoyed teaching) for very similar reasons to what you write about here regarding medschool. Awesome, thanks!

8. bronx43 said

   May 13 2008 @ 12:12 am

   Jawnyg, just take the MCAT and apply. You are a non-traditional applicant, so you aren’t measured by the same criteria that direct undergraduates are. Your previous engineering background is actually a very strong selling point, since you can use it to show just how much you want to go into medicine.

9. PeterK said

   May 14 2008 @ 10:21 am

   Now, I realized how rewarding a job in medicine would be after having my soul sucked away by engineering.
   —————————-

   What’s so soul sucking about doing meaningful and socially beneficial work building new devices/infrastructure or maintaining existing ones? Also , being well-compensated for it while working reasonable hours. Overall a pretty good gig

   Has its fair share of BS, but so does any job, and if you’re looking to cut down on your exposure to BS, medicine is probably not the way to go (Not a doctor)

10. CC said

    May 14 2008 @ 11:22 pm

    jawnyg,
    Think long and hard about going into medicine. I would give this advice to anyone, but it applies doubly to a 30 year old family man with a career already. There are a lot of things to consider that will drastically affect you and your family, should you take that route. There is another side to the story that the local DO students are not telling you.

    First, admission will not likely be a problem. You are looking at a local osteopathic school, right? Osteopathic (DO, doctor of osteopathy) schools have easier admission requirements than typical (MD, doctor of medicine) schools. This is not to say that DOs are inferior, but it is a statistical fact. There are many nontraditional students in DO school, probably more than MD school. Unless your grades are really low, you can probably qualify academically.

    However, do you already have all the requirements? Medical schools require Chemistry 1&2 (basic and organic), Biology 1&2, and Physics 1&2. I am sure, as an engineer, you have some of those. The MCAT is based on those subjects. It costs roughly $300, and you’ll have to devote a good bit of time and money studying for it (Kaplan QBank, an excellent course, costs ~$200 for a few month subscription.) The test is now computer based and administered year round (a good improvement from when I took it; at that time, you could take it spring or summer only.) Application costs several hundred as well and must be done in the summer/fall in time for interviews for admission the following year. So, if you didn’t need to take any additional classes, you could theoretically take the MCAT after prepping for the next several months and have your score in time to apply for 2009 admission.

    You haven’t mentioned any volunteer/medical experience, however, which is a de facto requirement to apply to medical school. Assume a year doing that. Realistically, 2010 is probably the soonest academic year for which you could apply.

    Let’s assume for the sake of argument that you are accepted to the school in your town (how likely you are to have to relocate depends on where you live in the country.) Unless you can do some extremely part time work, you will have to stop working; the volume of material is not conducive to being a working student. With a family, I think working through school would be impossible. So, unless you can drastically cut your expenses (to the level sustainable by loans), your spouse (assuming you are married) will have to be the bread winner for the next 4 years.

    Next, the expense. Medical school ranges from pretty expensive to astronomically expensive. In state tuition at a public school in some areas can be as low as $10,000; however, this is roughly as low as it goes. I don’t know of any osteopathic public schools, and they tend to cost more in the $20-25,000 range. This is just for tuition. Since, as above, your income will be on hiatus, you may need to borrow more for living expenses and health insurance, etc. You could have the military or public health service corps finance your education, (and they cover required health insurance and provide a stipend, too), but if you do so you will be paying them back with time later on.

    The time requirements during first and second year are roughly equal to a full time job. It is academically difficult, but nothing an engineer can’t handle. Third and fourth year, however, generally eat up much more time (like working more than full time during the day then being expected to study during off time.) There aer 3 required board exams during medical school: USMLE step 1, step 2 clinical knowledge, and step 2 clinical skills. For osteopathic school, substitute COMLEX for USMLE. The cost of these tests are $500 each for step 1 and step 2 CK, and $1007 for step 2 CS (current prices: expect them to increase by the time you would be taking them.) Additionally, Step 2 CS is only offered in 5 locations around the country, so include travel fees (it is worse for COMLEX PE, the osteopathic equivalent: there is one testing site, in Philadelphia, PA.)

    During third year, you need to decide what area of medicine to specialize in. Then, you pay several hundred dollars to apply to residency (postgrad) training programs. After getting interviews, you travel (generally at your expense) to interview locations. Unless there is a training program in your town, in the field you like, you will have to move for residency. I may catch flak for this, but osteopathic students are not as competitive as MD students for many residency spots. Being a DO limits your options for specialty in some ways (I know there are exceptions, but in general this is true.) As a resident, you will be working all the time for roughly $40,000 per year. When you finally get through residency (and possibly fellowship, more postgrad training in a specialty are), you will be an attending physician, commanding some degree of respect and making a respectable income (but still working a lot.)

    The whole shebang, medical school and residency, takes at least 7 years from the time of acceptance. So, the absolute earliest you could finish the whole thing is 2016 (more likely 2017.) Consider carefully the opportunity cost involved, 4 years of loans and no income, 3 years at least of subpar income, and all the time away from family, friends, and hobbies. Be skeptical about the hype about “saving the world” and “helping everyone” from idealistic medical students. While you certainly help people in medicine, you help people in most other fields in which you are a productive, honest citizen. While medicine may look romantic and fascinating from the outside, frequently it is (like most anything) a grind and very routine. If you have a family, consider carefully what a decrease in their standard of living would be involved. It all boils down to opportunity cost.
    If you haven’t already, check out Panda Bear, MD’s blog (link on this page). He went to medical school after 8 years in the USMC and time as an engineer, and I’m sure will have some insight into nontraditional medical application. But definitely talk to some practicing physicians in your area (family friend, your personal doc) about your ideas, and take their responses to heart. Don’t just listen to cheerleaders, take a very critical look at your choices. A lot of hardships are involved in medical education.
    Good luck.

11. Shining Hector said

    May 15 2008 @ 11:31 am

    Yeah I’m a non-trad with a bit of buyer’s remorse, too, and have to agree with the others to think this through. What’s soul-sucking about engineering that wouldn’t be about medicine? It’s honorable, socially valuable work. Do you hate the legal mess, bureaucracy, paperwork, repetitiveness, long hours, folks much less knowledgeable than you telling you what to do all the time? The grass really isn’t any greener over here. If you just want to deal with people more, there’s probably lots of ways to retool your current career path to get there and end up earning as much or more than a doctor that don’t involve going into massive debt and missing out on income for the better part of a decade of your most productive years.

12. anonymous said

    May 16 2008 @ 3:14 pm

    Did Charity Doc write this?

    Does anyone know what happened to him?

13. S. Solja said

    May 22 2008 @ 7:27 pm

    @shining hector

    any chance you’d be willing to share your experiences / reasons for buyer’s remorse? I think it would benefit a lot of us who are contemplating a career change into medicine.

    thanks

14. jimbo said

    June 1 2008 @ 10:59 pm

    Just found the site…love it! Graduated from medical school, literally yesterday. My thoughts are that I wish I could find one of those things in Men in Black where they zap your eyes & your memory from the last, oh say, 4 years is erased. I would just as soon forget all the unpaid labor and douchebag students/professors I’ve encountered. Graduation was all such a farce. The speaker talked of saving lives, excitement to be “real doctors,” etc. Meanwhile, everyone in our class is either ROAD, trapped in medicine by debt, extremely jaded & hating their life, or too dumb to notice the unending malaise that is clinical medicine.

15. Eric said

    July 17 2008 @ 12:12 pm

    “Graduation was all such a farce. The speaker talked of saving lives, excitement to be “real doctors,” etc. Meanwhile, everyone in our class is either ROAD, trapped in medicine by debt, extremely jaded & hating their life, or too dumb to notice the unending malaise that is clinical medicine.”

    Brilliant.

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