What are some alternatives to becoming a primary care doctor?
Asked by 17 years
I've wanted to become a doctor for a long time now, but since I've started digging into career choices more, it doesn't seem like an ideal career for me. Apparently, many physicians today spend more time with paperwork than with patients (according to US News). Though I don't mind paperwork, I'd like to keep people healthy, and _interact_ with people often. I also don't like that doctors prescribe painkillers when they don't know the source of the problem. What are some alternative careers for me?

Best Answer:
You and I have a lot in common. Please, please, please listen to what I'm saying. I just finished my first year and there is less than a 5% chance that I'll ever finish and go on to become an MD. If you want to help people, there are several ways to make an equivalent or greater impact than you would as a doctor. I'm starting a non-profit foundation to benefit children and further cancer research. If you've made it this far in your education, you are very bright and resourceful, so you'll have no problem standing head and shoulders above the crowd in whatever you do. If you want to make money, doctor is not the way to go (unless you can specialize and get into a VERY competitive field like dermatology, plastic surgery, etc.). Just do some fact finding about how different life is now vs. 30 years ago for a physician. Just a few stats I ran across when I was making the decision. Average pay relative to cost of living for doctors has gone down 7% in the same time period that almost every other profession has gone up. Starting next January, medicare is going to cut the amount they pay out to physicians by 40%. This is significant considering that 1/3 of the patients you would see are covered by medicare. Another red flag is that 57% of physicians tell their children to absolutely not pursue a career in medicine. And another dose of reality is that the U.S. is the only major country that hasn't switched to socialized medicine...do the research...in a nutshell its good for patients (sort of) but bad for doctors. I would be shocked if we didn't have socialized medicine 15 years from now, if not sooner. I know that I sound bitter and/or extremely negative....I have a lot of good friends that will make excellent doctors, and some of them may make a good living. I'm just saying that it's not at all what it used to be. Let me finish this rambling nonsense by saying that I've been obsessed with medicine since the 6th grade and I did just fine in my first year of medical school (better than average, but not top of the class). But before you devote 4 years of tuition and more importantly your time to a profession like this be very sure that you're not in it for the money (cuz it's elsewhere) or the satisfaction because out of 9 doctors that I've talked to that are close enough to me to actually care, only two have told me that they are glad they did it. I hope this helps. I wish I had looked at it from both sides before I had 1 year behind me...learn from my mistake. Soooooo....I just re-read your question and decided to actually answer your question instead of rambling. There are alot of things to do. Any type of science background would lend itself well to being a chemist. Start as an assistant earning $14 an hour and hope to get hired onto a team and earn $30,000 to $40,000/year. A GREAT alternative is to pursue pharmaceutical/medical sales. Still get to help people and be part of the greater good while making between $60,000 and $90,000/year right off the bat. (Plus you don't have to pay malpractice insurance or be on call!). With any sort of intelligence, you could go into business and make much better money than primary care docs. Of course you have to be good at what you do, but it's pretty easy to start in sales and move up the ladder pretty quickly if you have good people skills (which you probably have if you wanted to deal with patients every day). If you have questions about any of this or need any more advice on the matter email wunderbrs@yahoo.com. I'd be glad to give my advice on this because I was in your shoes a year ago. Good luck!