Dbate

Could everyone please offer all the reasons not to be a doctor? I am a high school student wondering whether to pursue medicine and business and I want to know the negative side of being a doctor against the postive for a realistic evaluation of the future.

norcalguy

In no particular order:

1. Huge debt-average medical student graduates with approx. $150,000.00 worth of debt

2. Long schooling-4 years of undergrad, 4 years of medical school, 3-8 more years of residency/fellowship

3. Declining salaries-physician salaries have declined approx. 7% in the past decade when you account for inflation

4. Long work hours, lack of a family life

5. Competitive admissions to medical school-60-90% attrition rate in premed at most colleges before application; among those that apply, 50%+ still don't get in anywhere

6. Rising malpractice premiums-malpractice has been increasing by around 10-15% a year for the past two decades

7. Loss of autonomy-the average physician today has less autonomy and patient trust than the physician 40 years ago; bureaucracy and fear of litigation has pretty much restricted the freedom a doctor has to practice

8. Mean, arrogant patients

9. Mean, arrogant colleagues

10. Mean, arrogant premeds

Outside of that, it's a lovely profession.

umardarr

hahaha I love the last 3. So true, especially #10.

Perfectedxchaos

Dbate, but those who seriously want to become doctors will apply again to medical school and bust their asses to make it happen. And those that do go into medicine, do it because they enjoy it. You cannot go to medical school and become that much in debt on something that you don't LOVE to do. You can't do it for the money because, even you mentioned the high malpractice rates and whatnot.

I guess my point is that even though there are so many reasons not to do it, that those who WANT to do it, will.

Bigredmed

You'd be surprised how quickly many residents lose their love of medicine.

Lockz

^But, is that because they find they dislike medicine or just the work conditions? Probably a combination of both, I suppose. What is the dropout rate at that point?

bluedevilmike

Basically zero.

norcalguy

Which goes back to reasons #1 and 2 for not going into medicine: after you've gone through the 4 year grind of medical school and you're 150k in debt, you pretty much have to become a physician whether you like it or not.

That is why we advise you guys to evaluate your motivation for going into medicine before entering medical school. Some premeds wisen up and switch to other careers during college. However, some premeds stubbornly proceed with the premed path even though they know medicine is not something they will enjoy.

Perfectedxchaos

But as much as there are those who reluctantly continue, I am sure there are still those people who were born to be doctors, that enjoy the intense work.

At this point in my life, I can't see doing anything else. But then again, I'm only 17.

Bigredmed

Yes, you're 17 and while it's no fault of your own, you and every other high school kid tends to believe that all they can be when they grow up is either a teacher, an engineer, a nurse, a doctor, a lawyer, or some sort of generic business person. A few of course still dream of being a professional athlete, and there are a few professions like Architecture, accounting, and "computers" that attract attention from a smaller number of people, but for the most part HSers have an extremely limited idea of all the possible career choices available to them.

bluedevilmike

Ahahaha. Platonic business.

JennieAS

That is so true. I was going to do some sort of sales when I first entered college. You really have no idea how many choices there are out there! I'm sure I still don't know half of them. Thank goodness for undergraduate and the time to become "wiser".

Perfectedxchaos

I know there is a huge chance I won't end up being a doctor. But for the past several years, well since 6th grade really, I've known I want to go into biology.

But it's such a broad field, I could end up teaching, or doing surgery. I don't know yet. But that's why there's college to figure it out.