<p>You’re right, Toledo. My kid should’ve headed northwest instead of northeast! I was amazed when I saw her schedule for the spring. They had final exams in 12 subjects, and the last one was three days before commencement. No senior week for them! So this week she’s at the shore with some of her classmates before starting rotations on Monday.</p>
<p>My wife chose an RN over an MD diploma because of the desire to have time with the kids (once she had them). Once we got out to Seattle she saw almost all the MDs working 3-4 days/week. She may have decided differently if she knew part-time work was an option for doctors.</p>
<p>Around here, NPs and PAs make about 75-100k/year, 4 days/week with evening and weekend rotations. In Washington, NPs can open their own clinics (CO and HI also if I remember correctly). Even though the need is greater in rural clinics, you will work longer hours for much less money.</p>
<p>A lot of entry-level jobs (and professional jobs in general) assume more than 40 hours/week.</p>
<p>My son is expected to work nights and weekends if they have time-sensitive stuff to get done and generally be available via email to answer questions off-hours.</p>
<p>Didn’t you mean “80-hour weeks”?</p>
<p>Many docs routinely work 60-70hrs a week. Always. For their entire careers. </p>
<p>NP would be a good option, imo.</p>
<p>Audiology. #1 best job in America 2011 according to CNBC, and #6 best in 2012. NOT a high stress 80 hrs/week job. Mostly 9-5/40 hrs week. Requires 4 years grad school for AuD degree. Salaries not nearly as high as MD, though.</p>
<p>what about a chiropracter?</p>
<p>qialah–nursing would be an option if she could go back and do another BA/BS.</p>
<p>At a scholarship day we were visiting with a bio prof and people were asking about research and shadowing RE medical fields. This school has a PA program as well as PT and a few other medical advanced degrees. Her insight was that the PA program was really set up for EMTs, military medics and others who have vast numbers of hours in professional medical fields already. It’s not set up for entry directly from BA or BS and attracts older students making a switch of some kind. Other programs may be different, but she felt that for the student following a direct undergrad to grad path (with requisite grades, scores, etc.) med school admissions were easier.</p>
<p>saintfan…That wasn’t Marquette by any chance? When we got a similar response from Marquette, we were furious, after making the drive to visit the school. I think there are some schools that are like that, but not many. C’mon…med school admission is easier that PA school admission!!! You really have to do a lot of research, as the program requirements are so different, but there are openings out there.</p>
<p>The most immediate decision is if you really want to apply to medical schools. Ask yourself why you wanted to become a physician in the first place (and ignore the doctor-wife-mother issues, it works as many of us can tell you- even when we faced a ton of gender discrimination decades ago). From your comments I don’t think you are that motivated to be immersed in medicine. The allied health professions may be your way to be in the health care world without the demands of becoming a physician. For now you can go ahead with the medical school applications and find out if any school will accept you. You can always decline an admission but if you wait several months you will miss many chances of being interviewed and accepted. You could retake the MCAT to raise your score but I suspect motivation is more of an issue than a low score.</p>
<p>Also research other fields. Figure out what you most like and dislike about them. Make lists. Do comparisons. Every field has fun, boring and distasteful elements. You need to decide priorities. At this point the time spent doesn’t appeal to you- check on how much time and energy is required to become any of the other professions you consider. You have to love a field to put up with the boring and other less enjoyable aspects of any field.</p>
<p>This is a good time to question your future. You can go ahead with the medical school applications but have plan B (and C) in mind.</p>
<p>PS to MiamiDAP- The first year of residency/internship is the toughest, followed by the 3rd year/first year of clinical rotations in medical school followed by the first year of medical school. Tons of new experiences, responsibilities, required material to be mastered all at once. But it is worth it to have mastered it and be competent. It doesn’t matter where you went to college- medical school is all new material and all colleges can teach you the same required base knowledge and thinking processes. The smartest/wisest medical students will have spent their undergrad years taking courses they can’t in medical school, not getting a preview of courses to make them easier. Presumably students majored in something they actively liked, not just something to prepare for medical school. Everyone has courses they love and hate- anatomy and physiology are necessary but some of us hated one and loved the other (memorizing is not my forte, how things work is more up my alley- not a surgeon!).</p>
<p>^^wis75 has wise words, as usual. I agree with everything. And double about using college years to enjoy learning, and one should study things you’ll never have a chance to again. Life is too short for college to only be a rehearsal for med school! The coolest (and brightest, I’ll add) docs I know were not pre-med majors in college, or were but had wide-ranging interests in other things as well. One of our very best mentors at our huge pediatric teaching hospital was a music major in college, another was a history major. </p>
<p>(I also hated anatomy— am so NOT a visual learner, but a verbal/reading learner! My dissections were not. good. Also not a surgeon!)</p>
<p>toledo: It was Pacific University on Oregon. “Easier” may have been a poor word choice on my part. I think she meant more straight forward for a student going directly from an undergraduate degree. PA programs require vastly larger numbers of hours of shadowing and/or on the job experience in a medical field. This woman said it was because the degree/career path itself was originally designed as a way for those with field medic experience in the military to transition to civilian medicine without starting over at the beginning academically. </p>
<p>I have not researched programs beyond this - it just came up, so I thought I’d pass it on.</p>
<p>“I’ll be the minority and say that I loved med school and loved residency. It was exciting and fun and truthfully not that hard.”</p>
<p>While I’m sure my memory has blocked out the worst over the last 20 years, I too think of “school” and “training” in general, as the best part of my medical career. I work “part time” (which amounts to about 40 hours), and aside for having no one to cover my patients, and having to be constantly vigilant about not sliding down a very slippery slope, at this stage of my career, the hours are not too demanding. </p>
<p>I also got pregnant during my last six months of sub-specialty training, and had my first at age 29. </p>
<p>And husband is also a doctor employed by a group, and him having insurance for our family makes MY choices a LOT easier. </p>
<p>None the less, I think I’d go with clinical NP or PA if I was starting out today.</p>
<p>I know a young lady who majored in Bio Chem.(graduated with honors in 2011) with plans for Med. school but apparently her MCATS weren’t impressive enough</p>
<p>She changed her course and applied to Nurse Practioner programs. She starts at the University of Virginia this fall.</p>