Weighing the Pros and Cons of Med School?

<p>I've been researching the benefits/drawbacks to going to medical school and there's a ton of articles warning potential doctors away from the field due to immense financial burden that will eventually dissipate any or all love you possibly have for the field. I want to ask any current medical school students: Is medical school really as hard as it appears? How is your financial debt (from tuition, etc.)? Thanks!</p>

<p>Not a med student, but parent of 2 med students.</p>

<p>**Is med school hard? **Yes, although not necessarily in terms of the difficulty of the material. The first 2 years are hard due to the sheer volume of material you need to learn. (Drinking from a fire hose analog applies.) The 3rd & 4th years (clinical rotations) are hard because you’ll be working very long and irregular hours, be at the bottom of the pecking order (Everyone gets to boss you around) and still have to learn large volumes of material. </p>

<p>Also the competition to get into med school is fierce. Fewer than 25-30% of freshman pre-meds actually end up applying to med school. Of those that do apply, only 40% get an acceptance to a med school.</p>

<p>The cost of medical school–the cost of medical education varies a lot</p>

<p>a) in-state public med schools can be a relative bargain to attend with tuition in some states being under $20K/year</p>

<p>b) whether or not you have any funding to help pay med school costs. (For example, some students work for a year or two before med school to save $$ toward med school costs or to pay off undergrad loans. Some families agree to give the balance of a student’s college fund to them for med school if the student chooses to attend a less expensive college or earns big merit awards to defray college costs.) </p>

<p>c) There are several programs which will pay for your medical school in return for you working as a physician in certain areas. One program is through the military, but others are offered by the federal or state governments.</p>

<p>See HSPS: <a href=“Health Professions Scholarship Program - Wikipedia”>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_Professions_Scholarship_Program&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>See NHSC <a href=“http://nhsc.hrsa.gov”>http://nhsc.hrsa.gov</a></p>

<p>d) there are a variety of repayment options for med school loans, including income-based repayment, pay as you earn and public service loan forgiveness. </p>

<p>See: <a href=“https://www.aamc.org/services/first/first_factsheets/112294/loan_repayment_choices.html”>https://www.aamc.org/services/first/first_factsheets/112294/loan_repayment_choices.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>As for my daughters–both will graduate with under $90K in loans. Very manageable. </p>

Thank you so much for your informative reply! Hopefully this is not too intrusive, but did your daughters attend the cheaper in-state schools like you mentioned?