DH considering becoming a doctor

[pinkgingham]

Posting here in case anyone has experience/advice they can share.

DH is 37 and in a fairly good career type role but it doesn't motivate him (it could uncharitably be called a bullshit job).

He wanted to study medicine at uni but instead did politics (got some dodgy career advice at school and was the first in his family to go uni).

He's wanted to retrain for many years but it didn't make sense whilst we were trying to buy a house, have kids etc.

He's now considering it properly for the first time. Unfortunately he has had to spend a lot of time in hospital recently due to serious illness in his family and it's really brought home to him that what the medical staff do is so meaningful, which is a direct contrast to his job (in his view).

We've worked out that we could afford to live on my salary for a few years if needed whilst he was studying, I appreciate that the hours are crazy and sometimes unpredictable and that it would put a lot more of the childcare burden on me. I still think it's worth it though as he has a lot of years left to work and you only get one life and it's a long time to waste in a job you think is meaningless. He would love to do it but is always more cautious than me.

Is this totally mad? Do people actually do this at 37? What do we need to consider?

Even a shorter, three year, degree would cost a lot, starting with fees and the opportunity costs of lost salary and pension.

Nope, he's he looked into allied healthcare professions? Not the easy route by any means, but extremely valuable roles that don't equate to the same crazy hours and requirement to move around potentially.

Do it. I was sinister too hoon, am 10 years older and wish I'd done it still.

He will have to get on though, they're used to be an age limit of 40 for entry to medicine (graduate or otherwise) due to NHS feeling it needed long enough to recoup it's training investment.

You are both in a fortunate position, make the most. Hell spend forget asking'what if' otherwise and he sounds like he'd be a great asset

I’d say go for it as long as he and you understand what you are signing up to. Medical school will be the easy bit, although he may well be sent on placements too far away to commute and end up staying.
Junior doctor jobs were brutal, night shifts, late shifts, weekends of 13 hours days. But often staying 1/2 hours late then a long commute (40 miles) home. Then studying for exams in the evenings/weekends. Deaneries (name may have changed now!) can be huge, Newcastle to Carlisle for example so you have to live away in hospital
Accommodation.
The exams are expensive and you pay for them yourself, you can now claim tax back which You couldn’t when I did them.
It is a good job and had its moments but I’m not sure I would do it again, although I don’t know what else i would have done!

I supervise junior doctors from a GEM med school as part of my job. 37 is most definitely not too old, we train doctors who are quite a lot older!
They often make the best doctors as they’re more motivated with lots of life experience and realise the grass is not always greener in a lot of corporate roles.
I would say go for it if that’s what you both really want but go in with your eyes open knowing that he won’t be available for family life often in the evenings and weekends. The med student hours are the easiest. Training as a junior doctor is antisocial but it’s not forever and you can pick your specialty so have some control over how antisocial you want your life to me.
My life is still very antisocial in my 40s but I wouldn’t change it for anything and I chose a specialty with a lot of out of hours work.
Good luck! Getting in to GEM will be the biggest stumbling block. Read the med student and junior doctor posts on Twitter. They will give you both an idea of what you will be signing yourself up for. FWIW I would do it all again without hesitation despite the state of the NHS, it is a very rewarding career and I’m still learning new things nearly 25 years on!

I used to harbour similar thoughts myself. Then I read This is Going to Hurt and that was the nail in the coffin for me.

A friend graduated medical school at 40 then had a baby during her foundation years which I gather was hell. She reckoned the foundation years were the hardest - your children will be older so that’ll be a touch easier.

If you’re in Scotland, there are fast-track medical degrees for older grads.

My brother trained as a chartered accountant, realised it wasn't for him long term, and then went into medicine. But he was 27 and unattached, not 37, and with a family. He qualified as a consultant surgeon, but decided he needed a break from the NHS, the relentless (and expensive) exams, the working over your tabled hours regularly, and he has gone abroad for a couple of fellowships. He told my (4) children that he could not recommend medicine in the NHS to them as a career - much of what @AgeingDoc wrote resonated with me as my brother has had similar experiences. It is, or can be very rewarding, but he said that staffing levels were often unsafe, the whole organisation is falling apart, the pay is not nearly as good as you expect, and that was before Covid hit, because he's been abroad since the first lockdown.

By all means look into it, but make sure you are all doing it with eyes wide open!

I dont think you mentioned how old your kids are. Worth considering how old they would be at the different stages of training as this will impact how involved he can be in childcare. I think as others have said it would be a very tough path. If he were aiming for GP rather than a hospital speciality then that would make a difference in things like training time, lack of shift work (once fully trained) and likelihood of getting a training post locally. Not an easy path at all and GPs work very hard/often long hours but some advantages over hospital specialties.

Also bear in mind that as a doctor in training working 'full time' in a hospital means doing 48 hours a week in most F1/F2 posts and specialties as your on calls push your hours up.......except it doesnt work out as 48hrs a week due to often long commutes as you may get rotated round hospitals, coming in early, staying late due to emergencies or just generally heavy work load/understaffing......not to mention your rest days on the rota involving you being like a zombie post night shifts...then theres the essential work needed at home including studying for exams/doing stuff like audit projects to tick boxes/mandatory eportfolio/ extra reading and learning. On the plus side the culture is changing and many specialties becoming more accepting of less than full time working which is great (though obviously impacts pay, pension and time taken to train)

Not much positive in this at all for OP (or the DC) for a decade or so.

And lots of drawbacks for them.

I studied politics at uni and have also gone on to a bullshit job. It is meaningless and soul-destroying. I wouldn't go as far to say it has made me depressed, but I certainly suffer low moods as a direct result.

I've started doing an access to HE course with the view of leaving work and studying midwifery.

If like me, he would have spent a long time mulling this over. I think you should try and support him whilst he explores other career avenues. As others have rightly pointed out, medicine is extremely demanding and you all need to be aware of the realities and go into it with open eyes. Perhaps there are other health related careers he could explore as well.

I do feel for your husband though. It is hard and I hope he manages to find a meaningful career wherever that might be.

I’d listen to @FazedNotPhased and also read/watch This is Going to Hurt by Adam Kay.
Would he consider being a paramedic? Less training but I should think very rewarding.

If he already has a degree and received Tuition fee loan I believe he'd had to self fund for another UG degree, so a PG degree would be his only option to avoid that. My DD is currently self funded for that reason (her DF paying) through UG Dentistry.

TBH I think that at 37 and with a young family, he will find it hard going.There will be little chance of having Family time, and being a patient in Hospital gives a rosy glow .My ambition was to become a Nurse mostly brought about by a Hospital stay as a Teenager .However a stint as a volunteer showed up what life was like behind the scenes as it were.

My husband did GEM in his late 20’s/early 30’s. I’d say that if you already have kids and if one of you is already established in a good career you’re already in a better position than we were. Financially, there are some good career development loans offered by banks for medicine.
The first three years are tough but fairly manageable in terms of family life as they’re classroom based. The following hospital-based training years are more logistically difficult as you’re trying to accommodate shift patterns that change with each rotation. That’s when I had to ask friends for help and have a bit of flexibility at work.
The main impact that age had on my husband’s training was his specialism choice - he went for GP as it’s a shorter route.
I have to say, the rewards have been great for us as a family as his career has given us the option to live anywhere, and has allowed me to retrain too.

What subject A levels does he have? I'd have thought going into a medicine degree you'd need to have at least two of the science A Levels, ie biology and chemistry. If he doesn't have those, would he need to factor in achieving those before embarking on his medicine degree?

Lord no . I am a doctor , started studying at 18 became a consultant at 43. The NHS is dreadful employer, training is so stressful. I’m here now and sometimes enjoy my job but it’s bloody hard. Don’t do it.

I have a lot of doctor friends and the only one who is happy is the one who locums 2 days a week on a fixed 8-4 shift. Everyone else wants out!

As a doctor personally I'd say absolutely not.

The thought of being a junior doctor, doing nights in my 40s - no. Could barely do it in my 20s. He also needs to have a hard look at what training looks like - it goes on a lot longer than medical school, multiple expensive exams, not much control in where you work - Deaneries cover vast areas of the country. A good analogy would be military postings.

I'm in a nice, family friendly specialty and I was talking a colleague this week - neither of us would pick it again because of the bullying, risk, underfunding and general misery.

The 'calling' I had in my teens is long gone and it's a job that I have learned to make work for me. It's also given me PTSD and life long mental health problems. I'm not unusual in senior doctors - we're all just surviving and working out when we can retire.

How about diagnostic radiography? The science and tech is really interesting and always advancing. Varied modalities to specialise in once qualified.
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He could train in CT or MRI and then onto reporting the images as a band 7 (as a radiologist would do). He could go on to become a sonographer, cardiac imaging or intervention radiology imaging (some radiographers also insert picc lines), usually band 6/7.

General x-ray is really interesting without even specialising, they rotate to theatres, endoscopy, A&E and resus, ITU, NNU and pediatric, all wards, in patients, outpatients, spinal pain clinics, advanced practice and reporting x-rays. It's so varied.

The degree is 3 yrs and pretty family friendly.

I come from a family of doctors and don't underestimate the effect it will have on your family. The long hours, the shifts, the shit pay at the beginning. Has he considered allied health professions role such as physio? There are opportunities to become advanced practionners as an allied health professional and they can earn band 8 salaries. A lot less stress and more fily friendly hours generally.

Honestly no, I don't think I'd be willing to support this. It would take such a long time, and require such a lot of sacrifices from you and the DC.

Not RTFT but there is a woman called Roopa Farooqui on Twitter who did PPE, wrote 8 books, and then retrained as a doctor in her 40s with 4 kids! She currently works as a junior doctor in the NHS and has written a new book about her experiences during Covid.

I don’t think that age is an issue as long as he has the motivation.

However, graduate entry medicine is VERY competitive. There is a lot to demonstrate over and above academic capabilities.

Assuming that he does get it, life is going to be very different for you and your children. It’s not just about childcare… think evenings and weekends.

And when he becomes a doctor, his profession will always take priority over yours as his job will be saving lives.

At the end of it all, it’s now even as lucrative as some people believe it to be.
L