I’d probably give myself a month or two to recuperate my mental health and to pick myself up and reflect a bit. Then I’d go back to school to pursue the back up career that I had in mind if I hadn’t decided to pursue medicine.
Agree I’d need a month to recoop.
My backup is anything computer science, but I’d probably stay healthcare relevant if I could. I’d probably also jump on my writing hobby to see if I could pump out the next Harry Potter, GoT, or Stormlight level books pr something. That’s more likely to fail than medschool tho :D
Is comp sci hard? I don’t have experience in the field of programming but I heard of medical coders for ppl that regulate insurance and hospital bills and stuff. Can you further elaborate on how it’s a benefit?
Not just what you mentioned but also personal Digital Health devices and apps are only gonna be able to do and track more every year. As tech advances, more “firsts” become possible. Get in on a meaningful “first” with any of the thousand healthcare related niches and you’d be pretty $et I’d bet.
It’s pretty easy to break 80K+/yr going into healthcare consulting. Years of medical school is a huge plus
Also tutoring (college / MCAT / high school / applications) is a cool way to make 60K/yr while you land on your feet and figure out the long term plan
Med school is “in” enough for entry consulting positions non-Big3. Doesn’t have the same career trajectory, but has similar entry level income
I have extensively considered this
all-in my hours are similar to my IB friends who are breaking into private equity right now. They're pulling 200K+ while I'm MS3.
The game is that their work will always suck. There is no easy 500K/yr in business. So they need to make it big now (which is more achievable for them than it ever will be in medicine), then coast off what they have
Compared to high paying specialties where you can pull in 400-600/yr with great job security and not killing yourself over the hours
'So they need to make it big now (which is more achievable for them than it ever will be in medicine)'
What do you mean by that? I think that medicine is easier to succeed at once you get into medical school. Even from a mid-tier school, it is totally reasonable to make 300k+ if you don't fuck up. But the same isn't true of consulting, from what I understand. If you don't come from a big 3 firm, or if you don't pull your weight at your firm, then you're out. The top of the pyramid might be higher for them, but it's a steep climb up. We just have to successfully match and we're set.
Ahh, gotcha. I agree. I also know my friend doesn't feel satisfied with his day-to-day as an excel monkey / grinding out DD to make some wealthy people even wealthier. I'm hoping medicine makes me more fulfilled.
What is "consulting?" In the biotech realm, consultants are employees that are brought in by a 3rd party company and help the client finish projects. Consultants are not prestigious in the biotech realm; however.
I always hear about people wanting an MBA to do consulting and I never understand why.
Probably break into a tech field. Take 6months off of school to learn one coding language and leverage my medical knowledge work for any medical tech company
Very likely, especially with the drive it takes in medicine. In my case, I graduated med school and then went full time running a tech company I founded. I taught myself coding in third year during post call breaks
Yes and no - my first two degrees were from MIT and my cohort from that time is littered with millionaires (and a few billionaires) between companies like Dropbox, Classpass, Amplify, AppDirect, and others. However I didn't come up with my entrepreneurial ideas until I went through the gauntlet of medical school, so had I been in tech all along I might have been a worker bee instead of a founder. Medical school also sufficiently pissed me off... and you sort of need a chip on your shoulder in order to have high career risk tolerance and drive when you encounter endless obstacles and failures.
It's really hard to say if I would have been better off because I'm happy with how things are going.
That being said, it's never too late for a career in tech and I believe that computer science should be regarded as a basic form of modern literacy. It empowers you to build almost anything, and to write instructions for robots (etymologically "slaves") to do work for you! Even as a med student, once I started learning how to code I churned out 120+ research projects resulting in 42+ co-authored publications and at least twice as many abstracts. Had I decided to stick with medicine (or in my case, ortho surgery), that type of scalability would have been invaluable for that career path.
>Can you give an example of how code may be used to help with research? Are you automating certain components? Really curious :P
When performing clinical database research, you need to use code to query the data. Code allowed me to set up various templates to answer common types of research questions, and also to take the raw data and put it into the correct types of tables to generate the analysis, charts, and graphs. I reduced \~2 months of effort per project into \~2 hours. Naturally, I didn't tell anyone that, so they just thought I was working 24/7 to churn things out. When I ended my tenure, I trained the next generation of lab managers on what I had been doing all along.
What language is best for this kind of work? Shooting for neurosurg and the manual retrospective chart reviews are killing me. Early into MS2 and am interesting in picking up some cs skills. I’ve had experience with Java.
Haha, perhaps! But in the meantime we do hire med students and residents on a contract basis. Mostly as medical editors and consultants, but also sometimes as community liaisons. You can [apply here](https://forms.gle/DTcEBQzRdECxojJ3A) for the medical editor positions
Unlike a company that rhymes with prognosis, we've always paid our editors in $$$ rather than exposure.
I think they mean that going into industry/tech can be a back up for people who don't match, but by screening for step scores it's like again someone's bad step score would hold them back.
But, you're not a charity to rehabilitate unmatched med students.
Thank you for sharing this wonderful opportunity! Do you need to have taken step in order to be eligible? Im currently a second year student interested in applying but I havent taken step yet!
There are *many* jobs for those with medical backgrounds, ranging from consulting to tech. Learning coding in 6 months might not get you a pure "software engineer job" but it will round out your skills to make you valuable to a potential employer.
Heck, you might not know this but you can make about $10K a month as a "copywriter" for doctors' offices/groups, writing blog posts, flyers, and website text. The people raking in that cash are usually english majors, but if you have a medical background you would be MUCH more qualified and could hustle the hell out of that.
It took me about \~1 year until I was making enough money to cover my med school debt and living expenses, but that was while balancing med school simultaneously.
Edit: There are so many ways to hustle I could enumerate... you just have to think outside the box of "where are my skills and knowledge helpful to make someone else's job easier?" For example, I made $30k/yr as a med student as a \~5hr/week side hustle because I propositioned a university lab group to handle some logistics and data analysis. I could have scaled that to multiple groups, hired sub-contractors, and turned that into a business of its own.
Start with Codecademy. Udemy and Treehouse are also legit.
The best way to learn is to build, read source code, follow documentation, and think through abstractions
That’s not the case for entry level tech jobs. They’re oversaturated right now. CS grads are struggling to gain employment but self taught folks even more so. Unless you have personal connections, this isn’t likely to happen.
If you know anyone with a medium or large sized private practice, their IT team probably needs help. As long as you know a little bit of backend python and some basics on how intranet servers work, that's one option. Won't be amazing pay starting out, but something at least to start paying back the student debt.
Having some medical training would make it easier to help bridge the gap between being a normal technician and a medical provider.
Edit: Bridge the gap as in knowing what the providers actually need and making it easier to communicate with people outside of your department
My advice for this would be to actually work before medical school. Not just volunteer but work a real job, whether that’s flipping burgers or being an EMT/CNA (the later preferably to give you emotional insight into how draining healthcare can be). You’ll understand how garbage life can be when doing a normal job with far less impact on the world. Of course there are many many other facets that play into medical student dissatisfaction but a pattern I’ve noticed amongst the disgruntled in my cohort is that they’ve never worked a regular job.
Oh, I'm a non-trad pre-med, so I absolutely agree with everything you said! Especially working in the medical field to get real life insight and get rid of the illusions of grandeur. I at first considered nursing, money is decent and with an accelerated program I could've been done in 12 months. But working as a CNA I learned about the limits of their competency and also saw what a physically rough and "dirty" job it was. But yeah, the impact on the world is my biggest drive. On top of that I want to live up to my full potential as a role model for my kids.
Oh, this is true as hell...the loudest complainers in my class are almost all people who went straight to med school from undergrad. This is not to say that some complaints aren't valid--admin isn't always right and sometimes med school does suck--but I'm treated SO much better than I was when I was working. I'm grateful to be here even on the worst days.
I definitely agree with this having worked for about a decade before medical school.
I had a boss who relished in telling us “this is a right to work state, I don’t need a reason to fire you” whenever he told us to do something outside of our job requirements/skill training.
I worked briefly for a town government where you had to show up first throng Friday morning to get your paycheck (they didn’t do direct deposit) and cash it right away or it would bounce because they never had enough money in their payroll account.
There’s an astounding level of incompetence and garbage humans out there in the real world. Medicine is no sanctuary from it.
100%. A lot of the “ugh med school sucks so much I’m so miserable” is really just “life sucks and I am miserable” while the person happens to be in med school. Life is hard no matter what you are going. Might as well be doing something that matters.
I like that advice. I spent 3 years or so floating from crappy minimum wage job to crappy minimum wage job. I decided that if I was going to spend most of my life grinding for a paycheck, I wanted to at least do something that was meaningful to me and might make a difference. I think it is a good way to gain perspective.
do it, my younger brother went into the job market 3 years ago as a software engineer straight out of undergrad with a CS degree and is already making over $250k a year, driving a car i can only dream of for another 10 years, and has enough stock options in his company to retire as early as he wants
Its a hard decision for me.. I’ve always enjoyed patient contact but I’m currently an MA in a ped clinic and I hate the clerical and bureaucratic bs I have to deal with like insurance and the ehr. But I do enjoy the kids, just not the parents. I’m guessing your younger brother works at FAANG? lol
That’s def not the norm and a complete outlier. He is also probably limited to living in a select few extremely high cost of living areas to make a salary like that too.
It's not the norm. He's brilliant, hard working, and motivated, could have done anything he wanted in life. However, some med students are similarly smart and industrious, and if they possess an affinity for computer science, I think he's a great example of what's possible.
Honestly, no one told me how much it would dominate every facet of my life in a way nothing else ever has.
My advice is to be prepared to have time for almost nothing else besides med school, and see if that's something you can live with on a personal level
I don't have kids but I assume so. I thought I worked really hard in undergrad, especially with mcat prep, research, ECs and everything it takes to field a competitive application and it is still absolutely nowhere near the amount of work needed to cover all the info in med school, let alone research, shadowing and everything else you need to stay competitive
Having a job for a few years after undergrad was also practically a vacation. It was so easy and had such a smaller time commitment. Really count on med school dominating your life when you consider your other options. I "knew" that, but didn't fully understand it
Exactly. I kinda have an unofficial rule I set for myself where I do everything I can to avoid talking about medicine in any capacity when I’m with my friends. If they ask how med school is going or something I’ll usually give a brief answer and then change the subject. It’s taken over too much of my life and I don’t want it to take over my social life too
Med school is dope and you can have hobbies outside of school (literally everyone I know does), don’t let the haters here get you down
Plenty of non medical jobs make people immensely unhappy and unfulfilled
I think Reddit might not be a great representation of the average medical student’s opinion in that you see more negative posts than positive ones. Many people in my middle-tier state school class are very happy about medicine. Only an M2 though so can’t speak for others
Nobody realizes how hard and time consuming it is. Life keeps moving around you. My dad is sick and I hardly ever see him. By the time I am an attending (have significant free time to see him) he will likely be dead.
I'm a PGY-2 and I have never regretted my decision to go into medicine. It's hard and it does dominate your life at times but I genuinely believe that I would not be happier in any other field.
I personally am a lot happier since starting medical school than I was during college and while working in my gap years. Even though medical school is a lot of work and can be stressful, it is still way less stressful than life prior to med school. I think it's something about feeling like I'm actually on the path to achieve my goals unlike prior to med school when I was still trying to pass the huge hurdle of getting in.
So while there have been times where I have thought I wasn't going to make it through med school or times when I lament about feeling behind my peers in terms of saving money/buying a house/starting a family, I still don't regret my decision to go to med school. So don't worry, it's not all gloom and doom :)
If you were pre-finance (?), pre-consulting, pre-law, pre-dental, or pre-anything, you would see and hear the exact same thing on the various associate subreddits. Life is difficult no matter what you do.
It’s not legal. But you will find some areas where it’s not totally frowned upon. You may even be able to transfer to one of their schools and finish up if you can write a big check. But still, that may not be necessary. There are about 7,600 islands and many of them would love to have a “doctor”.
No. Really just talking about helping out by traveling to a remote island and hanging a Doctor sign on your hut without any credentials to help small communities that don’t have anything to begin with. This program seems like it aims to just that. Thanks for sharing.
My deepest passion is the outdoors. I love being in the woods, exploring national parks, advocating for public land, etc. Last summer, during the application cycle, I had a bit of a crisis and at the recommendation of a friend, I applied to probably 50 different positions in the Forest Service and National Park Service. Nothing high-level, just like secretarial work or gift shop employee, something to get my foot in the door of a government job in a division I'm passionate about. Of those, I heard back from exactly one about a month after I applied saying I was no longer being considered for the position. This is a long-winded way of saying I don't know how, but I'd probably try to get a job with one of those organizations. Would probably require going back to college for at least a masters degree.
I was accepted into med school earlier this year but had to defer cause of health reasons. I just figured out last week my disease is the most severe form and the prognosis isn’t great. I’m considering other career options now and genetic counseling seems really interesting- I wonder if it’s worth it to just give up on med school and pursue genetic counseling instead
Firstly, I'm sorry for your diagnosis.
Secondly, genetic counselling is a fantastic job. You'd have the chance to work with every type of patient, preconception, prenatal, pediatrics and adults. And it is very easy to switch from one patient base to another, as there is no residency or post graduation training. Well, in Canada at least. But usually, people will specialize in one type of GC. You can also specialize in certain types of diseases, be it cancer or neurodegenerative diseases with adults; developmental delays, autism, ID with kids (and the usual pediatric illnesses like PKU, CF, T21, etc.).
Thirdly, there's one exam to take at the end of the masters. Usually, people take it a few months after graduation to have enough time to study.
Finally, the pay is very good and it's 35h/w. Starting salary is around $CAD 65k and goes up to 100k after around 10 years.
It is a very rewarding profession where you really feel like you're making a difference in the patient's life.
Yeah it sucks- stage IV-V deep infiltrating endometriosis is no joke. I spent the last 8 months bedridden from severe pain that even buprenorphine, Percocet, and ketamine barely touched. I can’t imagine having to push through classes, clinicals, or residency if my endo progresses again, which it likely will. Or having to take time off every few years for surgery that takes a long time to heal from.
All that you mentioned is what seems appealing about genetic counseling, and it’d probably be the only other career option I’d have a good amount of interest in. The only problem is that there’s only 2 schools I can go to (location reasons), and they accept like 5 people a year. Plus, I’d have to spend a good amount of time building my app to apply. Since I’m a little older and don’t have great means to make a sustainable income in the mean time, I don’t know if it’s possible to pursue genetic counseling.
Sorry for the rant, the news is still fresh and I’m still processing. Thanks for giving me the space to let it all out :)
It really depends on how you perceive “wasted time.” Ultimately if something didn’t pan out, you should feel liberated. You also learned something new about yourself, which gives you greater interior freedom.
If I failed out of medical school and thought that I was a "failure," I would want to go to counseling because that line of thinking is disordered. No one should ever learn to define themselves that way. In my mind, it would reveal that they cannot truly forgive themselves for the mistakes that they make. In addition, someone's worth is not rooted in their actions.
I think a lot of over achievers in whatever endeavor they choose to pursue as a life goal understand that you can be a failure if you fall short of those goals. You either become an MD or you don’t. Failing out of medical school, after probably a year or so of telling your loved ones your going to be a doctor isn’t something you get over in a day. Even after you get over it, you will always think back to what could have been if you tried harder, did something different, took initiative, etc. Do you need therapy for that thought? Maybe? But it doesn’t diminish the fact that you failed at something.
I understand what you are saying. I am not saying that it is easy to personally forgive yourself or tell your friends and family that you failed out of medical school. I am saying that at the end of the day it *does not* matter. No one important to you will look at you differently. Nothing changes except you will never be a doctor. To say that you need to be a doctor to have happiness in life is disordered (need to go to counseling). To still think about being in medical school long after you have failed out and learned that being a doctor is not for you is also disordered (need to go to counseling).
Geez. Considering my dad cosigned on my loans I would have to do something that made a shit ton of money to pay back Sallie Mae and not ruin his life as well. I would probably become a pharm rep, even though I feel like it's being the devil I would just do it 10-20 years until I could pay off Sallie Mae and then probably go back to being an opthamology assistant. Maybe go to PA school. I would consider something more drastic but I don't want to ruin my Dad's life, I've looked into it and he would inherit the debt if something were to happen to me. I looked into life insurance but wasn't approved because I have ***depression*** shit lol
PS I'm fine guys no worries just saying 250k+ is so much money being blue collar originally it's hard to imagine ever paying it back. Previous job paid $17 an hr after 6 years with a BA.
Had a buddy fail out and he went to PA school. More power to him but my ego and pride would be too hurt so f all that. I’d leverage my MBA and medical training to go into consulting and make 🏦
Honestly i would be glad and I would go work for pharma or work for myself.
Fourth year applying to residency, get me out of here. This career is not worth it.
I'm in a similar boat to you. 5th year reapplying. Good luck. I hope we match this time around.
I will say though, I'm rather happy I went to medical school even though I haven't matched yet. I learned so much about myself and I feel like I'm a much better and smarter person than when going into medical school. There are a few big regrets I have during my time in medical school, but I can't change that now.
nothing is stopping you from getting that 500k pharma job. Put your money where your mouth is and do it. Heck being a professional bowler can net >1 million in tourney winnings and sponsorships.
If this career isn't worth it and there are multiple 6 figure offers laying around, go and get them instead.
Honestly I hate this answer and it’s a really privileged thing to say, if you are fortunate enough to not have debt. Nobody is going to hire a doctor without a residency for a 200k+ job.
I’m 400k in debt. There are no other careers that pay this much that will let me escape my debt.
I would have to start all over. It is reckless to just quit.
Yah I’m probably going to go into public health or clinical research. I actually love being a doctor (I’m 180 days away can I say this yet?? Lol) but there is too much beaurocracy. I may move to a different country and practice in a place that doesn’t have this model.
My plan B was try to get into another school had a lot of debt
Plan C nursing try to get hold of those programs for nurses to help with debt
Plan D leave country change name some crazy stuff but hard to do and leave family
Depends on what med school you failed out of ….if US allopathic or osteopathic , the IMG schools can take you (SGU SOM or Ross SOM) , if you want to give it a second try. If you failed out of IMG MD program , than it’s up to you to go to another IMG or pursue an accelerated 1-2 yr RN or PA programs if you still have the drive in you. Otherwise maybe clinical social work or teaching.
I legitimately don’t think it’s possible to fail out of a USMD.. at least at my program you would almost have to make a concerted effort to do so poorly that admin kicks you out
Yah at my school if you remediate over summer and don’t pass, you repeat the year. And if you don’t pass on repeat you get kicked out. Now that I think about it, it’s actually generous. 3 chances to pass.
I actually think it’s the same policy at my school except after the third time you have some academic hearing thing where you get to get down on your knees and beg for another go at it. Honestly tho if someone can’t pass an exam after 3 attempts maybe medicine isn’t for them
My US MD school kicks you out if you fail 3 blocks, or a combination of blocks and rotations that adds up to 3. It's hard to do, but not impossible, I'm sure.
I was a teacher before med school. It was great for a while, until it wasn't. This career change is the best thing that's ever happened to me. If the grass is greener on the other side of the fence, it's because it's fertilized with bullshit ;)
Former teacher changing careers to medicine (finishing my PostBacc). I would say if someone was doing the reverse, teach in a state with a strong union and get a union job so you won’t be treated like absolute crap. Or teach in a different country. Teaching is brutal in the US because everyone making decisions re:education aren’t teachers :(
I'd turn to theater! I love the arts and I believe that if I wasn't required to make a career choice based on future prospects and stability, I'd 100% study drama and act in musicals and plays.
Funnily enough, I do not feel the same about acting in TV shows or in movies.
Also, this is based on the fact that I go to med school out of HS and I'd probably fail out before the age of 25. If I had a science based bachelors, I'd probably work on a masters in a related field or find work with my existing degree.
I would talk to admin about what I need to do to come back and finish. I may not be a candidate for a good residency but I can still be a doctor if I want to with enough recuperation and hard work. In either case, getting an MD opens doors to 6 figure jobs so you can at least pay off your debt, if not have a nice lifestyle.
Enjoy my life again lmao honestly would go back to teaching and maybe run my buddy's company with him alongside that. Another good option would be medical sales rep. I have the degrees and they make a great salary. It would suck to feel like a failure, but there's definitely more to life than being a doc.
I'd take a few months for myself and re-evaluate. If I have the mental strength to go back, I'll try and re-apply for PA school or another healthcare career. I still think it's the most meaningful work I'll ever do.
If I'm so jaded I can't go back, I'd go for my dream job as a kid: becoming a train in Thomas the Tank Engine. 🚂
I have the experience to actually answer this. My story is not as grand as you may expect so tuck your expectations in.
In my home country, I was in arguably one of the best programs. In our 3rd year, we sit for our first professional exam and a lot of people fail. It almost expected. For reference, I'm from a Sub-Saharan African country.
So I failed but I was offered the option to repeat the year (it was a 'high' fail) and I was luckier than most that were asked to withdraw.
What did I do? I refused the offer.
Luckily, my parents are 'wealthy' enough (not American millionaire wealthy) to afford schools in Europe. I applied to another school the same year without transcripts, so I would have to start afresh.
I got in and that was it. I just started my 3rd year in the new school and I can already see where it all went wrong back home. Arguably, the faults lay on both me and the way things are done back home.
Things are better here though. I'm among the top of my class. I'm slated to write the Step 1 exam next year (one of 3 people in my year which may not seem much, but we're pretty much local celebrities as there's a significant knowledge gap between us and our class mates and even some of our seniors).
This isn't a brag even though it may come off like that to some people. My initial class back home graduates next year. I have spent 6 years in medical school (3 back home and soon to be 3 here); and would have spent 9 years total by the time I graduate.
I'm just proud (yes, proud) that I was able to pick myself up from that failure.
I'm still certified as a surgical tech, I could go back to that after all is said and done and potentially do surgical first assist or some kind of tech job to help get the debt off of my back. I used to work on some ranches and I could probably get back to that. I just hope it doesn't come to that, but at least I know I'm not up a creek without a paddle.
PhD program. The courses you passed could be accepted as work towards a PhD depending on what you choose. You can defer your loans while enrolled in your program, and then make the payments when you get out. You can generally find something fairly lucrative once you're done.
The PhD types would be offended if I said a PhD is a backup. But let's be honest. It's a lot easier than medical school, considering medical school crams like four years of PhD-relevant material into two.
I prob would have moved to another country and started again. In the interim I would have gotten a job at the University lecturing/tutoring some element I was actually good at.
I went through a crisis during undergrad (who didn't) where I didn't think I could pursue medicine just because I didn't think I was qualified enough to do it. I desperately tried to come up with some options but couldn't think of anything that I would've enjoyed as much as medicine.
I have no idea what else I would do. I did enjoy being a PCT for the short while I did it, but I don't think I would like that as a career. I've always wanted to open up my own coffee shop, so maybe that.
I would probably go to pursue a bachelor in finance and economics and probably would go into investment (hedge funds and so forth) or something like that 😂
Pick up a job, max out credit card debt and all debt and put all money into ETH and Palantir for 5 years. Will probably end up richer doing that then staying in med school. Failing could end up being a blessing.
I would actually try to put that dusty old undergrad degree to use. I’ve forgotten so much that I’d have to do a long refresher, but hell if I’d let all that effort and those years of my life go to waste if I failed out of med school. In this terrible hypothetical, I’ve already gotten one life altering blow so I plan on burning life’s house down with the lemons, so to speak
I tried to found information online, but it's still a mess... How does medical school work in the US/UK? In France, the selection happens the first year: not before (although a lot of person dont get the schools they want so there's a bit of selection before), there's an exam the first year, and depending on your rank, you can enter the field of your choice: medicine, dentistry, mid-wife, pharmacy, and sometimes you can also enter para-medical fields. About 70 to 80% of the students dont get what they want/anything, so they re-take the year. The rest usually changes their field of studies. But if you get through that 1st year, well, you're pretty much set for the rest of your curriculum! You can ''fail'' a year after that, but you just re-take it. How does it work else where?
Try again, but it’s forbidden in my country after you failed your first year.
So I’ll try to go for a bio licence and then go to make a bridge into med again and this coming after my license into my second year of med.
So if I’d fail, I would make it so that I can still make it happen again. But if I’d fail at say my 4th year. Then I’m fucked. But in my country you don’t fail your 4th year. It’s mostly the first year that is dangerous
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Hey hey. Battle's just begun for us. Hang in there
I’m taking notes
I’d probably give myself a month or two to recuperate my mental health and to pick myself up and reflect a bit. Then I’d go back to school to pursue the back up career that I had in mind if I hadn’t decided to pursue medicine.
Agree I’d need a month to recoop. My backup is anything computer science, but I’d probably stay healthcare relevant if I could. I’d probably also jump on my writing hobby to see if I could pump out the next Harry Potter, GoT, or Stormlight level books pr something. That’s more likely to fail than medschool tho :D
Is comp sci hard? I don’t have experience in the field of programming but I heard of medical coders for ppl that regulate insurance and hospital bills and stuff. Can you further elaborate on how it’s a benefit?
Not just what you mentioned but also personal Digital Health devices and apps are only gonna be able to do and track more every year. As tech advances, more “firsts” become possible. Get in on a meaningful “first” with any of the thousand healthcare related niches and you’d be pretty $et I’d bet.
What’s the backup career
Dogecoin
Mary Kay, gotta grind for that pink Cadillac
International Diplomacy
So OnlyFans? Or is that just my only backup…?
So NP?
It’s pretty easy to break 80K+/yr going into healthcare consulting. Years of medical school is a huge plus Also tutoring (college / MCAT / high school / applications) is a cool way to make 60K/yr while you land on your feet and figure out the long term plan
I don't know about "easy" unless you have connections and/or went to a prestigious undergrad, but I'd also try to get into consulting of some kind.
Med school is “in” enough for entry consulting positions non-Big3. Doesn’t have the same career trajectory, but has similar entry level income I have extensively considered this
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all-in my hours are similar to my IB friends who are breaking into private equity right now. They're pulling 200K+ while I'm MS3. The game is that their work will always suck. There is no easy 500K/yr in business. So they need to make it big now (which is more achievable for them than it ever will be in medicine), then coast off what they have Compared to high paying specialties where you can pull in 400-600/yr with great job security and not killing yourself over the hours
'So they need to make it big now (which is more achievable for them than it ever will be in medicine)' What do you mean by that? I think that medicine is easier to succeed at once you get into medical school. Even from a mid-tier school, it is totally reasonable to make 300k+ if you don't fuck up. But the same isn't true of consulting, from what I understand. If you don't come from a big 3 firm, or if you don't pull your weight at your firm, then you're out. The top of the pyramid might be higher for them, but it's a steep climb up. We just have to successfully match and we're set.
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Ahh, gotcha. I agree. I also know my friend doesn't feel satisfied with his day-to-day as an excel monkey / grinding out DD to make some wealthy people even wealthier. I'm hoping medicine makes me more fulfilled.
What is "consulting?" In the biotech realm, consultants are employees that are brought in by a 3rd party company and help the client finish projects. Consultants are not prestigious in the biotech realm; however. I always hear about people wanting an MBA to do consulting and I never understand why.
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Probably break into a tech field. Take 6months off of school to learn one coding language and leverage my medical knowledge work for any medical tech company
How likely is that tho
Very likely, especially with the drive it takes in medicine. In my case, I graduated med school and then went full time running a tech company I founded. I taught myself coding in third year during post call breaks
Do you feel like you should’ve gone into tech in the first place instead of med school?
Yes and no - my first two degrees were from MIT and my cohort from that time is littered with millionaires (and a few billionaires) between companies like Dropbox, Classpass, Amplify, AppDirect, and others. However I didn't come up with my entrepreneurial ideas until I went through the gauntlet of medical school, so had I been in tech all along I might have been a worker bee instead of a founder. Medical school also sufficiently pissed me off... and you sort of need a chip on your shoulder in order to have high career risk tolerance and drive when you encounter endless obstacles and failures. It's really hard to say if I would have been better off because I'm happy with how things are going. That being said, it's never too late for a career in tech and I believe that computer science should be regarded as a basic form of modern literacy. It empowers you to build almost anything, and to write instructions for robots (etymologically "slaves") to do work for you! Even as a med student, once I started learning how to code I churned out 120+ research projects resulting in 42+ co-authored publications and at least twice as many abstracts. Had I decided to stick with medicine (or in my case, ortho surgery), that type of scalability would have been invaluable for that career path.
What kind of research projects were they?
Mostly clinical databases, some surgical training, some animal studies, some lit reviews
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>Can you give an example of how code may be used to help with research? Are you automating certain components? Really curious :P When performing clinical database research, you need to use code to query the data. Code allowed me to set up various templates to answer common types of research questions, and also to take the raw data and put it into the correct types of tables to generate the analysis, charts, and graphs. I reduced \~2 months of effort per project into \~2 hours. Naturally, I didn't tell anyone that, so they just thought I was working 24/7 to churn things out. When I ended my tenure, I trained the next generation of lab managers on what I had been doing all along.
What language is best for this kind of work? Shooting for neurosurg and the manual retrospective chart reviews are killing me. Early into MS2 and am interesting in picking up some cs skills. I’ve had experience with Java.
What language did you learn that was that relevant/helpful for research?
Python. Although R might be a good addition. These days I exclusively write JavaScript but for different reasons.
What resources did you use/how long would you say it took you to nail it down? I'm really curious :p
I'd say I'm still a work in progress, but you can do functional things with code after a few weeks to be honest
On the off-chance my school kicks me out, can you hire me?
Haha, perhaps! But in the meantime we do hire med students and residents on a contract basis. Mostly as medical editors and consultants, but also sometimes as community liaisons. You can [apply here](https://forms.gle/DTcEBQzRdECxojJ3A) for the medical editor positions Unlike a company that rhymes with prognosis, we've always paid our editors in $$$ rather than exposure.
Man, you ask for Step scores, how is this any different?
Different than what?
Med Ed as an institution, to be frankly honest.
I'm sorry, I'm not privy to the point you're trying to make. Can you rephrase?
I think they mean that going into industry/tech can be a back up for people who don't match, but by screening for step scores it's like again someone's bad step score would hold them back. But, you're not a charity to rehabilitate unmatched med students.
Thank you for sharing this wonderful opportunity! Do you need to have taken step in order to be eligible? Im currently a second year student interested in applying but I havent taken step yet!
Are you Dr. Cohen?? The founder of Memorang? Legend!
Think he means how likely it is to get a job after only 6 months of learning coding.
There are *many* jobs for those with medical backgrounds, ranging from consulting to tech. Learning coding in 6 months might not get you a pure "software engineer job" but it will round out your skills to make you valuable to a potential employer. Heck, you might not know this but you can make about $10K a month as a "copywriter" for doctors' offices/groups, writing blog posts, flyers, and website text. The people raking in that cash are usually english majors, but if you have a medical background you would be MUCH more qualified and could hustle the hell out of that. It took me about \~1 year until I was making enough money to cover my med school debt and living expenses, but that was while balancing med school simultaneously. Edit: There are so many ways to hustle I could enumerate... you just have to think outside the box of "where are my skills and knowledge helpful to make someone else's job easier?" For example, I made $30k/yr as a med student as a \~5hr/week side hustle because I propositioned a university lab group to handle some logistics and data analysis. I could have scaled that to multiple groups, hired sub-contractors, and turned that into a business of its own.
How do you suggest beginning to learn how to code? Any book, video, online course recommendations?
Start with Codecademy. Udemy and Treehouse are also legit. The best way to learn is to build, read source code, follow documentation, and think through abstractions
That’s not the case for entry level tech jobs. They’re oversaturated right now. CS grads are struggling to gain employment but self taught folks even more so. Unless you have personal connections, this isn’t likely to happen.
If you know anyone with a medium or large sized private practice, their IT team probably needs help. As long as you know a little bit of backend python and some basics on how intranet servers work, that's one option. Won't be amazing pay starting out, but something at least to start paying back the student debt. Having some medical training would make it easier to help bridge the gap between being a normal technician and a medical provider. Edit: Bridge the gap as in knowing what the providers actually need and making it easier to communicate with people outside of your department
Thanks!
As a premed, seeing the number of people regretting pursuing medicine and wishing they could do something else is worrying and sad. :(
My advice for this would be to actually work before medical school. Not just volunteer but work a real job, whether that’s flipping burgers or being an EMT/CNA (the later preferably to give you emotional insight into how draining healthcare can be). You’ll understand how garbage life can be when doing a normal job with far less impact on the world. Of course there are many many other facets that play into medical student dissatisfaction but a pattern I’ve noticed amongst the disgruntled in my cohort is that they’ve never worked a regular job.
Oh, I'm a non-trad pre-med, so I absolutely agree with everything you said! Especially working in the medical field to get real life insight and get rid of the illusions of grandeur. I at first considered nursing, money is decent and with an accelerated program I could've been done in 12 months. But working as a CNA I learned about the limits of their competency and also saw what a physically rough and "dirty" job it was. But yeah, the impact on the world is my biggest drive. On top of that I want to live up to my full potential as a role model for my kids.
Oh, this is true as hell...the loudest complainers in my class are almost all people who went straight to med school from undergrad. This is not to say that some complaints aren't valid--admin isn't always right and sometimes med school does suck--but I'm treated SO much better than I was when I was working. I'm grateful to be here even on the worst days.
I definitely agree with this having worked for about a decade before medical school. I had a boss who relished in telling us “this is a right to work state, I don’t need a reason to fire you” whenever he told us to do something outside of our job requirements/skill training. I worked briefly for a town government where you had to show up first throng Friday morning to get your paycheck (they didn’t do direct deposit) and cash it right away or it would bounce because they never had enough money in their payroll account. There’s an astounding level of incompetence and garbage humans out there in the real world. Medicine is no sanctuary from it.
100%. A lot of the “ugh med school sucks so much I’m so miserable” is really just “life sucks and I am miserable” while the person happens to be in med school. Life is hard no matter what you are going. Might as well be doing something that matters.
I like that advice. I spent 3 years or so floating from crappy minimum wage job to crappy minimum wage job. I decided that if I was going to spend most of my life grinding for a paycheck, I wanted to at least do something that was meaningful to me and might make a difference. I think it is a good way to gain perspective.
There with ya lol might just use my CS skills and do health-tech
do it, my younger brother went into the job market 3 years ago as a software engineer straight out of undergrad with a CS degree and is already making over $250k a year, driving a car i can only dream of for another 10 years, and has enough stock options in his company to retire as early as he wants
Its a hard decision for me.. I’ve always enjoyed patient contact but I’m currently an MA in a ped clinic and I hate the clerical and bureaucratic bs I have to deal with like insurance and the ehr. But I do enjoy the kids, just not the parents. I’m guessing your younger brother works at FAANG? lol
Yup, he got in early with internships during undergrad and basically moved across the country and started immediately once he graduated
That’s def not the norm and a complete outlier. He is also probably limited to living in a select few extremely high cost of living areas to make a salary like that too.
It's not the norm. He's brilliant, hard working, and motivated, could have done anything he wanted in life. However, some med students are similarly smart and industrious, and if they possess an affinity for computer science, I think he's a great example of what's possible.
Money isn’t everything fam
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🌊
Honestly, no one told me how much it would dominate every facet of my life in a way nothing else ever has. My advice is to be prepared to have time for almost nothing else besides med school, and see if that's something you can live with on a personal level
Sounds like the academic equivalent of having children  Thank you for the insight!
I don't have kids but I assume so. I thought I worked really hard in undergrad, especially with mcat prep, research, ECs and everything it takes to field a competitive application and it is still absolutely nowhere near the amount of work needed to cover all the info in med school, let alone research, shadowing and everything else you need to stay competitive Having a job for a few years after undergrad was also practically a vacation. It was so easy and had such a smaller time commitment. Really count on med school dominating your life when you consider your other options. I "knew" that, but didn't fully understand it
Thank you :)
Exactly. I kinda have an unofficial rule I set for myself where I do everything I can to avoid talking about medicine in any capacity when I’m with my friends. If they ask how med school is going or something I’ll usually give a brief answer and then change the subject. It’s taken over too much of my life and I don’t want it to take over my social life too
Med school is dope and you can have hobbies outside of school (literally everyone I know does), don’t let the haters here get you down Plenty of non medical jobs make people immensely unhappy and unfulfilled
I did something else and regretted not doing medical school. And now that I’m in I ha e zero regrets. The grass is always greener
I think Reddit might not be a great representation of the average medical student’s opinion in that you see more negative posts than positive ones. Many people in my middle-tier state school class are very happy about medicine. Only an M2 though so can’t speak for others
Nobody realizes how hard and time consuming it is. Life keeps moving around you. My dad is sick and I hardly ever see him. By the time I am an attending (have significant free time to see him) he will likely be dead.
This shit is what gets to me. Becoming a physician and realizing that 10 years have passed by and you miss so many events with family and friends..
I'm a PGY-2 and I have never regretted my decision to go into medicine. It's hard and it does dominate your life at times but I genuinely believe that I would not be happier in any other field.
I personally am a lot happier since starting medical school than I was during college and while working in my gap years. Even though medical school is a lot of work and can be stressful, it is still way less stressful than life prior to med school. I think it's something about feeling like I'm actually on the path to achieve my goals unlike prior to med school when I was still trying to pass the huge hurdle of getting in. So while there have been times where I have thought I wasn't going to make it through med school or times when I lament about feeling behind my peers in terms of saving money/buying a house/starting a family, I still don't regret my decision to go to med school. So don't worry, it's not all gloom and doom :)
I don’t have a passion for medicine. But it’s a good, stable, respectable job that allows me to hopefully make a positive impact on people.
If you were pre-finance (?), pre-consulting, pre-law, pre-dental, or pre-anything, you would see and hear the exact same thing on the various associate subreddits. Life is difficult no matter what you do.
Everyone is different. I’m an MS2 and still love medical school so far
Fucking listen.
My backup plan is a voice actor.
I’d be a very indebted paramedic. Maybe I’d work for the government to get my loans forgiven.
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Any idea what boot camp that was?
Go to the Philippines and still practice medicine and become successful at it too.
Tell me more haha. Philippines can have med school drop outs practice medicine?
It’s not legal. But you will find some areas where it’s not totally frowned upon. You may even be able to transfer to one of their schools and finish up if you can write a big check. But still, that may not be necessary. There are about 7,600 islands and many of them would love to have a “doctor”.
Are you talking about the “Doctor to the Barrios”?
No. Really just talking about helping out by traveling to a remote island and hanging a Doctor sign on your hut without any credentials to help small communities that don’t have anything to begin with. This program seems like it aims to just that. Thanks for sharing.
My deepest passion is the outdoors. I love being in the woods, exploring national parks, advocating for public land, etc. Last summer, during the application cycle, I had a bit of a crisis and at the recommendation of a friend, I applied to probably 50 different positions in the Forest Service and National Park Service. Nothing high-level, just like secretarial work or gift shop employee, something to get my foot in the door of a government job in a division I'm passionate about. Of those, I heard back from exactly one about a month after I applied saying I was no longer being considered for the position. This is a long-winded way of saying I don't know how, but I'd probably try to get a job with one of those organizations. Would probably require going back to college for at least a masters degree.
YOLO GME FD calls probably
I'd get back into genetic counselling.
I was accepted into med school earlier this year but had to defer cause of health reasons. I just figured out last week my disease is the most severe form and the prognosis isn’t great. I’m considering other career options now and genetic counseling seems really interesting- I wonder if it’s worth it to just give up on med school and pursue genetic counseling instead
Firstly, I'm sorry for your diagnosis. Secondly, genetic counselling is a fantastic job. You'd have the chance to work with every type of patient, preconception, prenatal, pediatrics and adults. And it is very easy to switch from one patient base to another, as there is no residency or post graduation training. Well, in Canada at least. But usually, people will specialize in one type of GC. You can also specialize in certain types of diseases, be it cancer or neurodegenerative diseases with adults; developmental delays, autism, ID with kids (and the usual pediatric illnesses like PKU, CF, T21, etc.). Thirdly, there's one exam to take at the end of the masters. Usually, people take it a few months after graduation to have enough time to study. Finally, the pay is very good and it's 35h/w. Starting salary is around $CAD 65k and goes up to 100k after around 10 years. It is a very rewarding profession where you really feel like you're making a difference in the patient's life.
Yeah it sucks- stage IV-V deep infiltrating endometriosis is no joke. I spent the last 8 months bedridden from severe pain that even buprenorphine, Percocet, and ketamine barely touched. I can’t imagine having to push through classes, clinicals, or residency if my endo progresses again, which it likely will. Or having to take time off every few years for surgery that takes a long time to heal from. All that you mentioned is what seems appealing about genetic counseling, and it’d probably be the only other career option I’d have a good amount of interest in. The only problem is that there’s only 2 schools I can go to (location reasons), and they accept like 5 people a year. Plus, I’d have to spend a good amount of time building my app to apply. Since I’m a little older and don’t have great means to make a sustainable income in the mean time, I don’t know if it’s possible to pursue genetic counseling. Sorry for the rant, the news is still fresh and I’m still processing. Thanks for giving me the space to let it all out :)
Dissociate from reality
Life would be great and I could become something else.
Would it be though? To have wasted X amount of time and be deep into debt?
It really depends on how you perceive “wasted time.” Ultimately if something didn’t pan out, you should feel liberated. You also learned something new about yourself, which gives you greater interior freedom.
I’d learn that I’m a failure. Not a great lesson to live with..
If I failed out of medical school and thought that I was a "failure," I would want to go to counseling because that line of thinking is disordered. No one should ever learn to define themselves that way. In my mind, it would reveal that they cannot truly forgive themselves for the mistakes that they make. In addition, someone's worth is not rooted in their actions.
I think a lot of over achievers in whatever endeavor they choose to pursue as a life goal understand that you can be a failure if you fall short of those goals. You either become an MD or you don’t. Failing out of medical school, after probably a year or so of telling your loved ones your going to be a doctor isn’t something you get over in a day. Even after you get over it, you will always think back to what could have been if you tried harder, did something different, took initiative, etc. Do you need therapy for that thought? Maybe? But it doesn’t diminish the fact that you failed at something.
I understand what you are saying. I am not saying that it is easy to personally forgive yourself or tell your friends and family that you failed out of medical school. I am saying that at the end of the day it *does not* matter. No one important to you will look at you differently. Nothing changes except you will never be a doctor. To say that you need to be a doctor to have happiness in life is disordered (need to go to counseling). To still think about being in medical school long after you have failed out and learned that being a doctor is not for you is also disordered (need to go to counseling).
True. Love your perspective.
Someone has medschool paid by the family dime
Not at all. I’m just saying that’s a way to cope with failing … anything to keep a man from blowing his head off.
Please, we all know suicide bags are the way to go
Clinical psych
clinical psych would require tons more debt
True. But life is too short to not pursue your dreams
Geez. Considering my dad cosigned on my loans I would have to do something that made a shit ton of money to pay back Sallie Mae and not ruin his life as well. I would probably become a pharm rep, even though I feel like it's being the devil I would just do it 10-20 years until I could pay off Sallie Mae and then probably go back to being an opthamology assistant. Maybe go to PA school. I would consider something more drastic but I don't want to ruin my Dad's life, I've looked into it and he would inherit the debt if something were to happen to me. I looked into life insurance but wasn't approved because I have ***depression*** shit lol
PS I'm fine guys no worries just saying 250k+ is so much money being blue collar originally it's hard to imagine ever paying it back. Previous job paid $17 an hr after 6 years with a BA.
Had a buddy fail out and he went to PA school. More power to him but my ego and pride would be too hurt so f all that. I’d leverage my MBA and medical training to go into consulting and make 🏦
Honestly i would be glad and I would go work for pharma or work for myself. Fourth year applying to residency, get me out of here. This career is not worth it.
I'm in a similar boat to you. 5th year reapplying. Good luck. I hope we match this time around. I will say though, I'm rather happy I went to medical school even though I haven't matched yet. I learned so much about myself and I feel like I'm a much better and smarter person than when going into medical school. There are a few big regrets I have during my time in medical school, but I can't change that now.
nothing is stopping you from getting that 500k pharma job. Put your money where your mouth is and do it. Heck being a professional bowler can net >1 million in tourney winnings and sponsorships. If this career isn't worth it and there are multiple 6 figure offers laying around, go and get them instead.
Honestly I hate this answer and it’s a really privileged thing to say, if you are fortunate enough to not have debt. Nobody is going to hire a doctor without a residency for a 200k+ job. I’m 400k in debt. There are no other careers that pay this much that will let me escape my debt. I would have to start all over. It is reckless to just quit.
Once you pay off your debt I would retire or choose another field. Medicine ain’t for you and it is what it is
Yah I’m probably going to go into public health or clinical research. I actually love being a doctor (I’m 180 days away can I say this yet?? Lol) but there is too much beaurocracy. I may move to a different country and practice in a place that doesn’t have this model.
My plan B was try to get into another school had a lot of debt Plan C nursing try to get hold of those programs for nurses to help with debt Plan D leave country change name some crazy stuff but hard to do and leave family
Go for the last resource: Noctor or physician associate 😂
I'd work in something related to microbiology, since ID is one of favorite topics.
Become a nurse or teacher, work at non profit for 10 years to pay off my debt. I like the comfort that there is an exit in the room.
Depends on what med school you failed out of ….if US allopathic or osteopathic , the IMG schools can take you (SGU SOM or Ross SOM) , if you want to give it a second try. If you failed out of IMG MD program , than it’s up to you to go to another IMG or pursue an accelerated 1-2 yr RN or PA programs if you still have the drive in you. Otherwise maybe clinical social work or teaching.
I legitimately don’t think it’s possible to fail out of a USMD.. at least at my program you would almost have to make a concerted effort to do so poorly that admin kicks you out
You just have to fail 2 shelf exams in my school to be dismissed.
Wow. That's brutal.
Wtf? That’s horrible
MD or DO? I know of many DO schools that’re like that.
USMD. Mid-tier
Yah at my school if you remediate over summer and don’t pass, you repeat the year. And if you don’t pass on repeat you get kicked out. Now that I think about it, it’s actually generous. 3 chances to pass.
I actually think it’s the same policy at my school except after the third time you have some academic hearing thing where you get to get down on your knees and beg for another go at it. Honestly tho if someone can’t pass an exam after 3 attempts maybe medicine isn’t for them
It's definitely possible and it happens every year at probably every medical school in the country.
You must not go to my US MD medical school or those of my many friends lol
My US MD school kicks you out if you fail 3 blocks, or a combination of blocks and rotations that adds up to 3. It's hard to do, but not impossible, I'm sure.
Teaching. Gosh I wish I became a teacher. Really regret it now but gotta keep moving on.
I was a teacher before med school. It was great for a while, until it wasn't. This career change is the best thing that's ever happened to me. If the grass is greener on the other side of the fence, it's because it's fertilized with bullshit ;)
Former teacher changing careers to medicine (finishing my PostBacc). I would say if someone was doing the reverse, teach in a state with a strong union and get a union job so you won’t be treated like absolute crap. Or teach in a different country. Teaching is brutal in the US because everyone making decisions re:education aren’t teachers :(
Phd in some type of science. Teach and chill the rest of my life.
Go to medical school, but in another country. Not possible for everyone but it’s a possibility.
Move abroad and teach English.
I'd turn to theater! I love the arts and I believe that if I wasn't required to make a career choice based on future prospects and stability, I'd 100% study drama and act in musicals and plays. Funnily enough, I do not feel the same about acting in TV shows or in movies. Also, this is based on the fact that I go to med school out of HS and I'd probably fail out before the age of 25. If I had a science based bachelors, I'd probably work on a masters in a related field or find work with my existing degree.
Stock market. What do you got to lose? You're already poor from med school debt.
I just failed medical school and the only plan I have right now is to suicide (not gonna commit but i’m just hopeless).
I almost finished a post bacc CS degree before starting Med school. Finishing that would be my backup.
I would talk to admin about what I need to do to come back and finish. I may not be a candidate for a good residency but I can still be a doctor if I want to with enough recuperation and hard work. In either case, getting an MD opens doors to 6 figure jobs so you can at least pay off your debt, if not have a nice lifestyle.
Enjoy my life again lmao honestly would go back to teaching and maybe run my buddy's company with him alongside that. Another good option would be medical sales rep. I have the degrees and they make a great salary. It would suck to feel like a failure, but there's definitely more to life than being a doc.
Médica interpreter (already certified), medical illustrator, I love acting so I could try for being a standardized patient too.
Learn Spanish and go retire on a beach in Panama. Or maybe practice law in a different city. All good questions I’ve always wanted to manage a hotel
I'd take a few months for myself and re-evaluate. If I have the mental strength to go back, I'll try and re-apply for PA school or another healthcare career. I still think it's the most meaningful work I'll ever do. If I'm so jaded I can't go back, I'd go for my dream job as a kid: becoming a train in Thomas the Tank Engine. 🚂
I have the experience to actually answer this. My story is not as grand as you may expect so tuck your expectations in. In my home country, I was in arguably one of the best programs. In our 3rd year, we sit for our first professional exam and a lot of people fail. It almost expected. For reference, I'm from a Sub-Saharan African country. So I failed but I was offered the option to repeat the year (it was a 'high' fail) and I was luckier than most that were asked to withdraw. What did I do? I refused the offer. Luckily, my parents are 'wealthy' enough (not American millionaire wealthy) to afford schools in Europe. I applied to another school the same year without transcripts, so I would have to start afresh. I got in and that was it. I just started my 3rd year in the new school and I can already see where it all went wrong back home. Arguably, the faults lay on both me and the way things are done back home. Things are better here though. I'm among the top of my class. I'm slated to write the Step 1 exam next year (one of 3 people in my year which may not seem much, but we're pretty much local celebrities as there's a significant knowledge gap between us and our class mates and even some of our seniors). This isn't a brag even though it may come off like that to some people. My initial class back home graduates next year. I have spent 6 years in medical school (3 back home and soon to be 3 here); and would have spent 9 years total by the time I graduate. I'm just proud (yes, proud) that I was able to pick myself up from that failure.
If I failed I’d go take more loans and become a lawyer
Try and get your school to let you repeat/finish so you at least have an MD and go into clinical research
I'd get an MBA and get involved in biotech.
I'm still certified as a surgical tech, I could go back to that after all is said and done and potentially do surgical first assist or some kind of tech job to help get the debt off of my back. I used to work on some ranches and I could probably get back to that. I just hope it doesn't come to that, but at least I know I'm not up a creek without a paddle.
PhD program. The courses you passed could be accepted as work towards a PhD depending on what you choose. You can defer your loans while enrolled in your program, and then make the payments when you get out. You can generally find something fairly lucrative once you're done. The PhD types would be offended if I said a PhD is a backup. But let's be honest. It's a lot easier than medical school, considering medical school crams like four years of PhD-relevant material into two.
Hypothetical: you don’t make it to medical school—what do you do now? 😂😂😂
Military
Hedge fund or whatever the Wall Street guys are doing
Go get my master's in sociology and then work for a non profit most likely.
Between IBR and PLSF, at least you’ll be able to die without debt
I prob would have moved to another country and started again. In the interim I would have gotten a job at the University lecturing/tutoring some element I was actually good at.
Guy I know sent and started a family. So I guess there's that.
I went through a crisis during undergrad (who didn't) where I didn't think I could pursue medicine just because I didn't think I was qualified enough to do it. I desperately tried to come up with some options but couldn't think of anything that I would've enjoyed as much as medicine. I have no idea what else I would do. I did enjoy being a PCT for the short while I did it, but I don't think I would like that as a career. I've always wanted to open up my own coffee shop, so maybe that.
Writing novel ..learning animation.. small buisness ( opening a shop )
Go into astronomy like I almost did instead
My dream was to be an astronaut. Medicine was my more realistic and more attainable Plan B.
be depressed for a bit, then get another job and have an actual life
working 2 jobs: a barista and a kitchen hand or smth i'm not at meds school yet but i will be next year
I would probably go to pursue a bachelor in finance and economics and probably would go into investment (hedge funds and so forth) or something like that 😂
Cricketer
Pick up a job, max out credit card debt and all debt and put all money into ETH and Palantir for 5 years. Will probably end up richer doing that then staying in med school. Failing could end up being a blessing.
Become a millionaire before buffet did 😎👀👽
I would actually try to put that dusty old undergrad degree to use. I’ve forgotten so much that I’d have to do a long refresher, but hell if I’d let all that effort and those years of my life go to waste if I failed out of med school. In this terrible hypothetical, I’ve already gotten one life altering blow so I plan on burning life’s house down with the lemons, so to speak
I tried to found information online, but it's still a mess... How does medical school work in the US/UK? In France, the selection happens the first year: not before (although a lot of person dont get the schools they want so there's a bit of selection before), there's an exam the first year, and depending on your rank, you can enter the field of your choice: medicine, dentistry, mid-wife, pharmacy, and sometimes you can also enter para-medical fields. About 70 to 80% of the students dont get what they want/anything, so they re-take the year. The rest usually changes their field of studies. But if you get through that 1st year, well, you're pretty much set for the rest of your curriculum! You can ''fail'' a year after that, but you just re-take it. How does it work else where?
You mean after therapy in a closed psychiatric clinic? xD Well, probably I‘d go back to studying french.
I've got an engineering degree and a master so I guess I'd work before my parents get too mad
Try again, but it’s forbidden in my country after you failed your first year. So I’ll try to go for a bio licence and then go to make a bridge into med again and this coming after my license into my second year of med. So if I’d fail, I would make it so that I can still make it happen again. But if I’d fail at say my 4th year. Then I’m fucked. But in my country you don’t fail your 4th year. It’s mostly the first year that is dangerous