Quote from smoss:
Dazed- sorry to say but you're quite disillusioned regarding medicine. I AM a doctor. Wen't to a top 10 med school and a great residency, but those things have NOTHING to do with how much money you make. I specialize in Emergency Medicine, which is at the higher end of the income range. As others have said, not sure where you're getting your info. That ad that you posted did not include many things, such as it likely does not cover malpractice insurance, which will be 100K-200K per year, probably does not include overhead, and mentions nothing about hours involved or how many nights of call per week. Working 24/7 with your beeper on always and up 5 times a night is no fun for sure, and yes, many doctors do have that lifestyle. The largest determining factors for income are specialty and state you practice in. Primary care, for example, (family practice, peds, and internal medicine), which makes up the bulk of physicians, earn between 60K and 120K generally, depending on state. Emergency Medicine, working equivalent to a full time job number of shifts, pays 120K or less in many states (AZ for example pays very low) up to 300K in others. I live in Las Vegas, which pays the high end of the scale.
Let me just say, medicine SUCKS! Of the about 50 doctors that I current know and interact with, including my wife, at least 47 hate their job and are looking at pursuing different careers. First, there is 4 years of useless medical school, most costing 50-100K per year, then 3-10 years of residency and fellowship, depending on specialty, which truly is non-stop, not exagerating-torture. Pretty much your whole waking life at the hospital, being payed 30-55K/year ( I made 31K my first year, 35 my 3rd, which was 6 years ago). So let's say you think cardiovascular surgery sounds nifty (8-10 years of residency/fellowship). Thats 14 years after college when you finally will begin your life. So you'll be about 35 years old, be probably 300K in debt not including your undergraduate, perhaps married, unlikely kids yet, and done essentially nothing with your prime physicial years-no travel, no vacations, no sports. Then, when you finally get your first real job, you'll probably be starting around 300-400K/yr for CV surgery, with a pretty darn demanding and time consuming job. So then... hopefully you'll love the job. 90% of medicine now is paperwork and avoiding getting sued. 9/10 doctors currently hate the job, all specialties. I'm not making that number up, that's my personal experience and interaction with all specialties in my role as an emergency physician. So here I am, 36 years old, married thankfully, no kids, debt paid off, working part-time in medicine trying to find a different career, hopefully trading if I'm really lucky.
So if you still have some unusual passion for medicine, go for it, getting into medical school has never been easier as less and less people want to do it.