To change careers and become a doctor at 39?

[ValleyOfTheTramadols]

Just that really. I have a degree and a masters in humanities and history respectively but have always been interested in science and medicine as well. My masters specialised in medical history. I’ve spent a lot of time in hospital with my son recently and I have developed a strong urge/feeling/calling to retrain in medicine. I would have to sit A levels in two science subjects before applying to a medical course but I could do that in a year. Then with the six year medical degree and first foundation year I could be a ‘full’ doctor by the age of 47. Nearly 20 years or more left of a career by then. I only recently completed my masters so I’m used to intense study as an adult and I can afford it financially. But am I just deluded?

Agree with pp re the nursing route being long aswell - I am an advanced practitioner, nursing background. Three year degree with an expected level of some experience in healthcare to become qualified. Then at least 2-3 years experience post qualifying before being considered for advanced practice courses/prescribing/examination skills courses (national stipulation of entry requirements). For advanced practitioner completing MSc which can be another 2-3 years.

Add to that shift work & studying whilst working potentially full time.
I'm 38 and have considered transferring to medicine but to be honest for all the reasons mentioned I just wouldn't put myself and my family through it - not for the pretty crap salary (for the magnitude of responsibility), stress and burnout, shitty morale within the healthcare sector, seriously high risk of PTSD and other psychological problems.

A balanced life is just worth more IMHO. I love my job and patients but honestly your swimming against the tide 95% of the time.

Junior colleagues in their 30s are finding the rotas are killing them. In their 40s? Unimaginable.

I’m just finishing my training to be a GP and was so so glad to have hospital jobs behind me aged 30. I already don’t know how I could go back to consecutive 13 hour night shifts, then into days, or working 12 days in a row (half of which were 13 hours) and being shuffled around the country, new hospital every year, rota with no flexibility and given only a few weeks in advance - filling rota gaps in areas which I’ve no interest in and given little useful training.
Realistically if you persue GP training and work full time you’ll have 4 years of hospital rotations after medical school which can be 48 hours/week average on paper, lots more in reality, long commute unless you move house every 12 months.
Then probably 2 years of GP training and more exams, hoops to jump through, little control over where you work.
Then - the average GP retires at 57.
You don’t say how old your child is, but I’d seriously consider pharmacy, physicians associate, other allied Heath professions on the basis they will give you much more control over your life much sooner.

Sorry if already mentioned but what about training to be a vet?

The training deanery areas are huge so placements can be very very far apart. Worth considering as you don't get to choose where your placed.

@JollyJoon

Sorry if already mentioned but what about training to be a vet?

Why? The degree is the same length, costs & entry requirements, & the salary is far lower. Plus OP hasn't indicated they want to work with animals (& their owners). She'd also need to undertake a decent chunk of work experience (couple of weeks in a vet practice, couple of weeks lambing/calving & some kennel/cattery/equine experience is the usual minimum).

I opted not to complete a medical degree after my bio degree. I have friends who are training and it is years and years of training not just the six at uni, probably around 10 years after a level before you are earning any kind of decent wage. If I were you I would do a science course and then do a physicians associate course, like a junior doctor level.

and just to add a lot of places will take you on for a two year course in science with a previous degree and then the physicians associate is a year.

One other point to bear in mind is that you'd have to show quite a bit more commitment to the job than you've shown to this thread

As other posters have said , look at AHP or Nursing, I'm an AHP, qualified 20 years ago at 35. I chose my degree over nursing or medicine due to my family (single mum),
I have a highly specialist role now equivalent to advance nurse practitioner and I have a part time academic post on top.
I love it.

I had a really amazing GP (who's just recently retired) but who started her medical training in her late 30s - and has just retired 40 years later.

SHE WAS THE BEST.

I also had a friend who started pre-med when he was 39 - he now works as a clinical fellow.

@WeDidntMeanToGoToSea

IIWY I would want to be sure that this urge/sense of calling isn't an emotional response to what sounds like a traumatic period of your life and/or an attempt to displace feelings about that.

Also, to have recently completed your Masters at age 39 suggests you were doing something else before that - what prompted that change, or decision to study?

I think the first paragraph here is a really good point - maybe reflect on this - I wonder if a session with a counsellor/careers counsellor/coach would be helpful?

My other thought - I wonder if it's about being "part of" what's going on at the hospital.

I often thought it would be nice to be a hospital hairdresser (in the days when there was such a thing!) - part of it all, and everyone's always pleased to see you!

Can I just point out that yes nursing isn’t as full on but is still bloody hard work, nights, long days, essays, tutorials exams etc, if you’re off sick during a placement you have to make the time up in what little time you already have. Also only really possible if you have really good support from your partner and solid child care in place.

Depending on where you live they can also send you miles away from home, my nearest hospital is 30 mins away so early leaving to get there in time and late getting home after a 12 hour shift, I also have people in my year who get send when further away nearly 2 hours etc to nursing homes

Yes, and nursing is physically difficult as well - many nurses (and more HCAs) end up with back injuries.

Nursing is not a career for Drs who missed the boat (for whatever reason). This idea that people become nurses (or other HCPs) because they ‘couldn’t be doctors’ is very frustrating. They are totally different, equally valuable professions in the chain of patient care, though there are some nursing roles that align with some medical roles (eg ANP & Physician Associate).

The training is tough on family life, perhaps not as bad as medical training due to deaneries and duration but like medicine, it needs a commitment to lifelong learning, CPD and further exams and qualifications to move up the ranks. It’s not the ‘easy route’. The dropout rate of the course and the recruitment and retention rates of qualified nurses should tell anyone that.

@TwinsTrollsAndHunz

Nursing is not a career for Drs who missed the boat (for whatever reason). This idea that people become nurses (or other HCPs) because they ‘couldn’t be doctors’ is very frustrating. They are totally different, equally valuable professions in the chain of patient care, though there are some nursing roles that align with some medical roles (eg ANP & Physician Associate).

The training is tough on family life, perhaps not as bad as medical training due to deaneries and duration but like medicine, it needs a commitment to lifelong learning, CPD and further exams and qualifications to move up the ranks. It’s not the ‘easy route’. The dropout rate of the course and the recruitment and retention rates of qualified nurses should tell anyone that.

I don’t think for one second nursing is an ‘easier’ route but it is objectively a shorter and cheaper one and you get more control over your life much sooner. You can tailor how you progress and the speed you move up banding, rather than medicine where it’s based on exams and time served, and ultimately don’t choose where you work until consultancy. Nursing of course is a totally different career, but it can be a springboard into similar clinical roles as doctors.

@BobLemon

This thread has reminded me of something that has been puzzling me for a while. Why are Uni places/training places for Drs so limited? When so much points to there being a shortage of Drs??

This is a question I'd like answered, too.

As evidenced in this thread, doctors are burning out of the profession due to an insane and often harrowing workload. So why on earth would medical schools not open up more of their already competitive places? The demand to study medicine is there. People want to become doctors. There is a chronic doctor shortage. There are understaffing issues. So why aren't more doctors being trained up?

With more doctors in the profession, current doctors would be able to have an improved work-life balance -- or at least a semblance of it. A happy, healthy doctor benefits all of us, so I don't understand why more people aren't advocating for this.

I asked a doctor friend this question and she said the BMA (?) had voted not to increase capacity at medical schools.

Hearing about the hoops her son has to jump through to have a hope of going to med school, there must be lots of kids who would make great doctors but don't receive places as it's insanely competitive.

In theory YANBU, I did a graduate entry medicine degree and had friends older than you (but didn't have any children). In reality, I think you will struggle. I'm 32 now and approaching end of GP training like @PinkDaffodil2. I'm knackered and don't think I would cope with foundation training again. The shifts are brutal, switching hospitals, lengthy commutes, nights. I'd think very hard about it and speak to lots of people actually doing the job. Don't just speak to people at medical school, that's the easy bit!

@mnp321 does your friend read the DM or is she quite right-wing in general? This is what I found “the BMA welcomes increased medical school places” www.bma.org.uk/bma-media-centre/bma-says-increased-medical-school-places-are-welcomed-but-funding-must-be-found-for-extra-clinical-placements

Medical student numbers are centrally controlled anotherchocolate - medical schools can't just increase numbers. Its the same as numbers of training posts in various specialties. The numbers are supposed to tally with the predicted demand by the time people come out the other end of training. Obviously that's quite hard to do though, and sometimes they get it hopelessly wrong. For example, during my career I have seen an absolute glut of Obstetricians which led to quite large numbers either leaving the country or swapping to something else part way through their training. Then less than a decade later there was a shortage in the same specialty. It is a very inexact science.
To be fair, there are a lot more places at medical schools than when I was applying - in fact there are quite a few more entire medical schools and I believe there is talk of more being formed. But as also evidenced on this thread it takes a long time for an uplift in student numbers to translate into more fully trained doctors.
The medical workforce has also been hit by, amongst other things, changes in immigration and employment policies that made it much harder for doctors from outside the EU to work here, and then by EU doctors leaving after Brexit.
The reasons for burnout are complex and not restricted to staffing numbers, though I agree that understaffing does play a significant part and training more doctors would be a big help in due course. I suspect it ultimately comes down to money though.

@mnp321

I asked a doctor friend this question and she said the BMA (?) had voted not to increase capacity at medical schools.

Hearing about the hoops her son has to jump through to have a hope of going to med school, there must be lots of kids who would make great doctors but don't receive places as it's insanely competitive.

The BMA is a trade union and does not have anything like this kind of power!

Hmm I did wonder if I had misheard the name!

Yes it's the government that dictates the number of medical school places available, not the BMA (thankfully, they're a top notch trade union but should not have that kind of power!). This is partially as the government subsidies medical school fees but more importantly, you should only put as many students through medical school as you have trainee roles available as quite rightly you don't put people through the degree only to not have a job available for them. Newly graduated doctors aren't just released into the wild, they have quite intensive input into their ongoing training as a foundation year 1 and 2 doctor, then a specialist or GP trainee for many years after that and again the number of training posts for each specialism is controlled, in theory based on demand but the system is complex and there are factors like immigration that are hard to predict (and some specialisms are always more popular/competetive than others) and the people doing the planning have to do a bit of crystal ball gazing as the training itself takes so long plenty can change in the meantime... Hence it's not quite as easy as 'we need more doctors, train more' although in some senses it absolutely is that simple, we've definitely been under-investing in training doctors as well as nurses and other clinical roles in the UK for a long time, heavily relying on 'importing' from other countries as the UK/NHS is seen as a desirable place to be by many other nationalities, whether that will stay the same in the years to come remains to be seen...