Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
washingtonpost.com
Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
1–10 of 170 posts
Re: Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
#2I wish more people knew and understood this. I didn't write about the suicide angle specifically, but I did write, "Why you should become a nurse or physicians assistant instead of a doctor: the underrated perils of medical school:" https://jakeseliger.com/2012/10/20/why-you-should-become-a-n..., which covers similar topics.
Re: Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
#3I see parallels with medical school in tech hiring.
They put the students through hell because that's what they had to go through, and they're rent seeking.
In most other countries, doctors don't have an accreditation board. Most things are simple, and it doesn't require years of school to set a bone or put in some stitches, or even diagnose the flu or pneumonia.
Similarly, you don't need a rockstar or ninja to write your CRUD app. Anybody who knows what he's doing will be able to do that, he doesn't need to be the best of the best, he just needs to be competent.
Re: Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
#4Many people want the status associated with being a doctor (of course some are pushed that direction by parents and some also just want to help people). When you have an abundance of people trying to get into an industry the profession have the ability to only choose the absolute pinnacle of talent. It's the same with being a pilot. Many of them work long hours in shit conditions for years hoping to get a decent route. I have often had notions of throwing my career in to be a Doctor but the price you pay to climb to the top of the heap is not worth it, long hours, student loans, bad pay for the first decade, no social life, worry about malpractice, make it simply not worth the tradeoff for some status and job security.
Re: Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
#5> . Fortunately, others are speaking up as well. In online magazines and on NPR, medical students who have lived through suicide attempts, depression and other mental-health issues are standing up against this stigma. Medical schools are now training faculty to recognize risk factors for suicide and assuring students that seeking help isn’t a sign of weakness.
I wonder whether and hope that mental illness will end up like homosexuality in the sense that people will no longer have to hide who they are. On the other hand, I suspect that would be a more difficult battle, especially when it comes to employment discrimination.
Re: Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
#6I see parallels with medical school in tech hiring. They put the students through hell because that's what they had to go through, and they're rent seeking. In most other countries, doctors don't have an accreditation board. Most things are simple, and it doesn't require years of school to set a bone or put in some stitches, or even diagnose the flu or pneumonia. Similarly, you don't need a rockstar or ninja to write…
Which are the countries where doctors don't have an accreditation board? The history of physicians controlling who is allowed to join their ranks goes back centuries, at the very least.
Re: Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
#7I see parallels with medical school in tech hiring. They put the students through hell because that's what they had to go through, and they're rent seeking. In most other countries, doctors don't have an accreditation board. Most things are simple, and it doesn't require years of school to set a bone or put in some stitches, or even diagnose the flu or pneumonia. Similarly, you don't need a rockstar or ninja to write…
I have a friend in med school and his experience doesn't sound like tech hiring at all. From what I can tell, med school isn't hard because of rent seeking, but because there is frankly just a very large amount of things you have to learn in a short amount of time. They also have to work extremely long hours on certain rotations. I was shocked at how little sleep he could get on some days.
On the other hand, he seems to not have experienced the bullying described in the article, so maybe that part of it is the rent seeking you describe.
I do think that tech hiring is a little ridiculous at times, but if doctors mess up, people sometimes die. It would make much more sense for them to go through accreditation like engineers do, in my opinion of course.
Re: Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
#8> . Fortunately, others are speaking up as well. In online magazines and on NPR, medical students who have lived through suicide attempts, depression and other mental-health issues are standing up against this stigma. Medical schools are now training faculty to recognize risk factors for suicide and assuring students that seeking help isn’t a sign of weakness. I wonder whether and hope that mental illness will end up…
San Francisco is a sanctuary city for counterculture. As more counterculture becomes acceptable outside of sanctuary cities, more marginalized people remain or come to the sanctuary cities partly due the history of catering to marginalized people.
I think that would be a decent way for you to see a possible outcome in that field too in order to create a conclusion.
Re: Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
#9"You are grounded until you become a doctor!" - One chinese dad to his young son.
Re: Medical school can be brutal, and it’s making many of us suicidal
#10I see parallels with medical school in tech hiring. They put the students through hell because that's what they had to go through, and they're rent seeking. In most other countries, doctors don't have an accreditation board. Most things are simple, and it doesn't require years of school to set a bone or put in some stitches, or even diagnose the flu or pneumonia. Similarly, you don't need a rockstar or ninja to write…
I have a friend in med school and his experience doesn't sound like tech hiring at all. From what I can tell, med school isn't hard because of rent seeking, but because there is frankly just a very large amount of things you have to learn in a short amount of time. They also have to work extremely long hours on certain rotations. I was shocked at how little sleep he could get on some days. On the other hand, he seems…
Agree with most bits, but the hours thing is ridiculous in med, in a very bad way. It doesn't have to be either... (Slowly changing for the better).