What if I don't do residency?

[marthasunny]

Hi!
As a fourth year medical student, I am toying with the idea of not doing a residency and instead just going into the real world and obtaining a job. Do any of you have experience with obtaining a job after graduating (without continuing on with an MD)? What kind of jobs would be available to someone?

Thanks for responding!
Martha

[leadsled]

Hi!
As a fourth year medical student, I am toying with the idea of not doing a residency and instead just going into the real world and obtaining a job. Do any of you have experience with obtaining a job after graduating (without continuing on with an MD)? What kind of jobs would be available to someone?

Thanks for responding!
Martha

Unless you are Dr. Jarvis and invented the artificial heart, you will be dead in the water without completing a residency! At a minimum, pass steps 1 through 3 and do a PGY-1 so you can get licensed in a couple of states as a General Practitioner. Nevertheless, this is still a poor option and leads to very limited opportunities. Your best option is to complete a board certifiable residency then go on to do research or teaching, etc, if that is your desire.

You don't want to hear this but I have numerous friends that graduated with a foreign M.D. and never got a residency and are doing odd jobs such as delivering Oxygen bottles, driving taxicabs, loading boxes, working as a surgical technician/assistant, salesman, nurse, etc., just to make their student loan repayments. Count your lucky stars if you get a residency because for the most part it is the only way to salvation for the M.D.

[davinaMD]

u can get a pharma job in different depts: pharmacovigillance, regulatory,
i know lots of foreign docs dat dont practice nd r making 6 figure incomes in pharma companies....but most of them practised in their countries..
there r opportunities if u look. an mph or mba will help....dependng on ur interests. a friend frm columbia med w MD/MBA dint do residency at all.. he went straight to wall street as a healthcare analyst fr a hedge fund...u get d point
checkout : nonclinicaljobs.com

[Minimed77]

Other uneducted people make much more money than people with an education (such as owning a franchinese store like Subway or Blimpie). These are just examples of how to make money an easier way, and surely if you stick with residency you will be sucked into the "hard working life" path of a physician whose net worth in the end doesnt amount to ----.

No offense, but only someone who has never worked a day in your life would imagine ridiculous tales of "uneducated people making money with minimal effort". Do you really think owning and running not just one but "few Burger Kings" is an easy way to make money?

I used to work in finance for a decade, and started my working life in high school...at Burger King. I am now post bacc premed and applying to med schools. Yes it isn't easy to become a doctor, all the elitist roadblocks in the way doesn't help, but to be deluded enough to think the rest of the world isn't working as hard as physicians is actually rather insulting!

To Martha...I am thinking of doing just Med School and skipping Residency as well. Personally it is because I am in my 30's and don't want to be in school forever. I have been told I can go into Research no problem (they look at your MD title, not if you are licensed when you are applying for grants - and actually they love folks with MDs way more than PhDs, go figure), or work in "The Real World" such as Big Pharma, Regulatory, Insurance companies, etc. It would prolly be easier to get these non-Hospital jobs (I am understanding that is what you meant by "Real World") if you did a residency, but I have always learned that when there is a will, there is a way and you don't have to follow the established path in front of you just because that is what everyone else does.

My advice from being in the business world all these years?? Find and talk to successful folks who have MDs and who are not in clinical practice. Find someone to Mentor you. Interested in being an executive at Pfizer? Look up the Medical Officers and network. Find out how they did it and what their advice is. Or look up their credentials - ie do they have MBAs or JDs too? Like business or health administration? Get an MBA or MHA. Public Health? MPH would be fabulous. All these degrees are way less time and energy than a Residency. Do you have a business school at the same school you are completing your med school? If so, maybe go talk to one of their advisers. I am sure they will have great ideas and realistic options and advice for you.

Good luck

[MD_DREAMER]

>replying to 8 year old conversations.

No offense, but only someone who has never worked a day in your life would imagine ridiculous tales of "uneducated people making money with minimal effort". Do you really think owning and running not just one but "few Burger Kings" is an easy way to make money?

I used to work in finance for a decade, and started my working life in high school...at Burger King. I am now post bacc premed and applying to med schools. Yes it isn't easy to become a doctor, all the elitist roadblocks in the way doesn't help, but to be deluded enough to think the rest of the world isn't working as hard as physicians is actually rather insulting!

To Martha...I am thinking of doing just Med School and skipping Residency as well. Personally it is because I am in my 30's and don't want to be in school forever. I have been told I can go into Research no problem (they look at your MD title, not if you are licensed when you are applying for grants - and actually they love folks with MDs way more than PhDs, go figure), or work in "The Real World" such as Big Pharma, Regulatory, Insurance companies, etc. It would prolly be easier to get these non-Hospital jobs (I am understanding that is what you meant by "Real World") if you did a residency, but I have always learned that when there is a will, there is a way and you don't have to follow the established path in front of you just because that is what everyone else does.

My advice from being in the business world all these years?? Find and talk to successful folks who have MDs and who are not in clinical practice. Find someone to Mentor you. Interested in being an executive at Pfizer? Look up the Medical Officers and network. Find out how they did it and what their advice is. Or look up their credentials - ie do they have MBAs or JDs too? Like business or health administration? Get an MBA or MHA. Public Health? MPH would be fabulous. All these degrees are way less time and energy than a Residency. Do you have a business school at the same school you are completing your med school? If so, maybe go talk to one of their advisers. I am sure they will have great ideas and realistic options and advice for you.

Good luck

[Minimed77]

>replying to 8 year old conversations.

Lol...last post was only a year or so ago...and it is still a relavent topic. I would be curious to see what Martha did in the end

[MD_DREAMER]

I wonder if she regrets it?

Lol...last post was a year or so ago...and it is still a relavent topic. I would be curious to see what Martha did in the end

[Minimed77]

I wonder if she regrets it?

Or better yet...she may be happy as a clam and successful in her life in whatever definition that may be for her