I'm now an MSIII (third-year student), if you can call it that at this point. I've finished my second-year course work and I'm now studying up for my Step 1 board exams (USMLE and COMLEX) that are about a week away. Studying has become a way of life and I try to embrace it as an opportunity to expand my life and myself as a person. I had a friend, Jered, in undergrad who was one of the first people to really make me realize that learning and studying doesn't have to be boring. It doesn't have to be a chore. Sometimes learning can be exciting, especially if it's about something you're passionate about. I look back through some of my posts now and laugh at how I thought I was 'soo busy' when I didn't even know the half of it. I now spend about 12 hours a day studying for my board exams and a couple hours off is a blessing. The past year of school was absolute hell, but I made it through. I guess as you get through school you get stronger, or maybe just more tolerant, of having no life and devoting your life to studying. "Come on now Ben, don't try to sound selfless, you're going to be a doctor and doctors make bank"... is that what you were thinking? Come on, you don't have to lie. Well, I guess that brings me to my next point.
One of the things we struggle with as a medical students is debt. When all is said and done, I'll be sitting on about $400,000 of debt. And that doesn't include the interest that I'll have to pay on that capital amount throughout the rest of my life. What I'm going to start talking about now is repayment. How much do doctors earn? It depends. According to Careers In Medicine (a group of AAMC), family physicians on average make around $160,000/year. General surgeons make $343,958/year. Radiologists make on average $440,000/year. The range on these figures is huge, but guess what's the same? The cost of medical school. The US is facing a dramatic loss of primary care physicians and with the incoming baby boomer generation not only needing care, but many of them retiring from medicine themselves, where are we going to end up? Is it any wonder why students are making conscious decisions to go into specialty medicine where their compensation is vastly greater than that of a primary care physician? Would you be willing to take a hit of that much to be a family physician? The problem is that medicine is a business. In order to be a smart businessman one needs to make sound financial decisions. If everyone's input is the same, then why would you willingly choose a career that has a lower output (salary), it just doesn't make sense. The argument of many is that those who go into specialty fields worked harder or are somehow smarter than those in primary care, but this is a ridiculous claim. The field you go into should be dictated by some degree by one's intelligence, but who's to say that an extremely intelligent person shouldn't choose to go into primary care because he enjoys it more than another field? I actually found an incredible article online written by Kevin Pezzi, MD that compared the amount the average doctor makes compared to a UPS delivery truck driver. Who do you think made more money? Believe it or not, the UPS driver. I put the graphs to the side here on the right. There has been a lot of talk about moving things around with healthcare to try and put this fire out, but I honestly don't see a clear solution in the future. Don't get me wrong here; I'm not complaining about how much I'll be making. I didn't chose to become a doctor so that I could 'rake in the cash'. I chose to be a doctor because I love what I do. I chose to be a doctor because I enjoy having a high tier of understanding of the human body and what makes us tick. I chose to be a doctor because I love helping people. How much will it cost me to be the physician I want to be?
In happier news, I'm proud to announce that my younger sister, Katie Smith, will be starting her first year here at Midwestern in just over a month! I'm so proud of her and I can't wait until she's gotten started so we can discuss all these exciting things we learn in school. I wish her all the best and I hope she comes to me when times are hard for a good pep talk.
Well, I must be off. The fact that I'm writing a blog and not studying for my boards probably isn't good, but hey, we all have to relax every once in a while, right? Until next time, stay happy!
-Student Doctor Benjamin D. Smith
Physician salary graph: http://shortwhitecoats.com/2012/the-ultimate-guide-to-physician-salaries
UPS driver vs physician salary graphs: http://www.er-doctor.com/doctor_income.html
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