Future Docs

When our house Elizabeth was here last week, we talked about medicine, as she's a nurse practitioner in Orlando.  She mentioned how when she started, about 10 years ago, many of the residents who passed through Orlando Regional were white Americans, and how lately they seem rarer.  The kids are, of course, way smart, but she met many Indians, and Africans.

I told her that, of my many doctor friends, NONE had kids going into medicine.  It simply was no longer worth it, to put in 4 years of college, 4 of med school, and minimum of three after that before you could start making a living.  It used to be a GREAT living -- and that's much harder to find for docs these days.

One friend of mine, Jeff, who's a reformed lawyer, does have a girl in med school, in Chicago, and he tells me most of her classmates are Indian.  It makes sense -- the dream of immigrant parents is to have a kid in "the professions," which meant medicine or law, at least to my parents' generation, and newer groups to the  US have adopted the same dream.

I noticed the same phenom among the Ds' friends.  I think they only know a small handful of classmates who went to medical school -- their peers who DID want to go into health care chose fields like PT, or OT, or Physician's Assistant.  They can do well with much less school.  Makes perfect sense.

Of those who DO go into medicine, the modern advice is to take the ROAD (Radiology, Opthamology, Anesthesiology, or Dematology).  These fields give the best living, after all the training.  Sure enough, Jeff's girl probably wants to go down the O path...

When FIU asked the state for a med school, they argued that they would be the community school -- putting out primary care docs, which would be in short supply.  They argued that their low tuition would allow their grads to stay off the ROAD, and instead become family docs, pediatricians, ob/gyn docs.

Not so fast.  Dr. Barry, who is a student of medical student training, tells me the FIU kids chose the ROAD in the same proportions as do the UM kids.  They want the big bucks, too, and who can blame them after all that school.

When D1 was getting her MS, she took pre med classes and got As.  A doctor friend, a big shot academic at the U, told her she ought to consider med school.  D1 reacted like Amy Winehouse did at the suggestion she go to rehab: No, No, No.  D1 saw first hand the trials of med school, and chose to stay away.  I was very happy she did.

I have a feeling the future docs will be more and more from other places, and that will be fine.