To consider studying medicine at 43?

[PurpleOrchid42]

And with 2 ND kids, aged 6 and 2? Is this completely unrealistic? Or is it possible to live that dream?

No, don’t do it. I have ND dc, and if you think it gets easier as they get older, in some ways it does, but in other ways it really really doesn’t.

It’s possible. One of the best doctors I’ve ever worked with qualified later in life. I just wouldn’t encourage you to do it. It’s a fucking shit show. You’re going to be treated like shite. If you’re interested in healthcare go the nursing/ahp route then you can do a masters for a ACP. You will be treated slightly better, earn a bit more and have more career options.

DNs doing medicine at the moment. It’s tough, and they’re only early 20s. Can’t imagine older and with young kids.

I would consider looking at the Physicians Associate Programmes. You should be able to undertake postgrad study if your first degree is biology and the training is faster and more fixed.

A friend did it and they are now training to be a consultant in their 50s. They have no regrets. But no partner or kids, which makes a huge difference.

The main reason not to is the likelihood of having to uproot your entire family 3 or 4 times in the next 10-12 years.

Once when you get into med school
Again when you get into foundation
Again into core training
Again into specialty training
And potentially again when you get a permanent job.

The location of any or all of these career stages may be out of your control and you could literally end up going to Newcastle Uni, doing a foundation programme in London, core training in Birmingham and specialty training in Yorkshire (with placements in hull, Bradford, Scarborough, Leeds, then Airedale) before getting a permanent job in Manchester.

I'd say you'd be better doing PA training, but hopefully we doctors will get our act together and shut that con down.

I would love to study medicine but it is easy to say in my head there is no way on this planet I would become a doctor the 18 hour days the weird shifts no chance

I am very thankful people do it though!

I'm going to buck the trend here...I taught (Primary to A level) for 30 years...retrained in Social Work in my 50s...it was exhausting and exilerating..and I was a single parent of ND kids. I didn't have shift work, but did out of hours and weekends. It will be very hard but unless you try what have you to lose and teaching certainly makes for great resilience.

It's not impossible, nothing is. But it would likely be unpleasant, expensive, exhausting, relationship testing etc and mean you would largely be an absent parent for big chunks of your dc's childhood.

You would be doing your course with an overwhelming majority of high functioning, highly competitive but lacking life experience 18 year olds. You would be unlikely to have true peers and you would be the one not joining in with the pub golf etc. Med school is an endless merry go round of high stakes assessments, placements in difficult to get to places and an awful lot of observing other people at work whilst feeling a bit stupid and a lot in the way in the early years. Being really bad at something or observing without input is much harder for adults than teens.

Working as a doctor, especially as a junior Dr is unenviable. You don't have much say over where you get a job, much less when you have time off. My cousin couldn't get time off for her own wedding! And you'll get paid less than you were on as a teacher for ages. Staying up all night, knowing if you forget something or don't concentrate properly a patient could be harmed is intense and night shifts can shorten your life! Switching from days to nights, covering weekends and Christmas, missing birthdays etc....its your kids who would bear a lot of the impact.

Really, just why would you?!

Sorry, had to finish previous post abruptly. What I wanted to say that with ND children things can go very very horribly wrong at school and socially (especially in secondary school), and they need a lot of time, encouragement and support (from parents). I have found that things are always much more difficult for my dc if I am not there, or if I can’t give them time. Each child will have their own challenges, whether ND or not, but I have found that navigating years 9-11 (gcse years) and years 5-8 (transition and early secondary sch) with an ND child to be quite labour intensive. And I do not know how I (or they) would have coped if I had had to work full time / outside the home. It may be different for other families with ND, but I have been so thankful that I have been able to step back from work during these periods. I think retraining in something like medicine would put you (and your family) under too much pressure. Sorry.

I’m a GP partner, train GP trainees in practice and teach graduate entry medicine at a medical school too. I’m (very) late 30s and have ND son aged 11.

I would hate to dissuade anyone who really wanted it away from medicine. It is a hard job and the NHS is particularly difficult at the moment but it’s still, mostly, a job I live. I work 3 days a week in practice, one at the university and still log on from home at the weekend to keep on top of things. I couldn’t do it when my son was younger.

Realistically though I think it may be too late. Undergraduate medicine is hardcore, full in and demanding. Graduate entry medicine even more so. Foundation and Specialty training is also incredibly difficult and while some specialties like GP are better for hopefully being able to train more locally, being a GP is not an easy job to do if you’re not suited to it, as I’m sure you know if you’re married to or related to one.

I would also think about whether being an ANP or PA is right if what you really want is medicine. ANPs and PAs while important parts of healthcare team are not doctors and some of the students I teach have gone to medical school after PA/nursing because what they want is to be doctors. Other areas of allied health e.g OT or areas like medical research, genetic counselling or pharmaceuticals might be worth looking at too.

In my 20s I did plenty of night work in clubs and with little or no sleep, I was sharp and functional the next day. Now in my 50s, if for some reason I have a sleepless night, either because I am flying on a red eye or an event, I feel so sick the following days.
I wouldn't be able to do night shifts again. A junior doctor gets the worst shifts.

My mum should have been a doctor. She was easily bright enough but her parents thought she should focus on finding a husband and having babies. Once we were nearly grown and she was 40 she retrained as a nurse. She's found it really satisfying. After building experience in various areas she became a nurse specialist and also did her prescribing course, and does lots of teaching now in her specialism. She's hugely knowledgeable and finds it really satisfying.

Similarly the two medical professionals who have really become valued people in mine and my children's lives are our specialist nurses. We all have complex conditions and have regular contact with our specialist nurses and we absolutely value them.

It seems really egotistical actually to think you are not like everyone else - you can do it despite not studying for twenty years, despite not having the energy of a twenty year old, despite having dependents who need a reliable presence at home, despite knowing you wouldn't bring in any kind of a wage and would also have a student loan, or pay out a hell of a lot of money not to, and despite knowing you'd have to move around the country. It's so unrealistic it's laughable.

Something like this is achievable and realistic, if not hard work.

Medicine is going to be extremely hard (at any age, let alone 40 with 2 children) and is an all round terrible idea.

I'm a great believer in nothing being impossible. I would definitely say it wouldn't be worth it though. Most junior doctors are unhappy with their living and working conditions and we're talking about a group of people who have already sacrificed a lot to get through the exams to get there. So, not generally a bunch of moaners.

Your family life will suffer. Your children will miss you. Don't do it OP. Most 54 year olds are planning retirement at 60 in medicine. Being on the wards on call in your 40s and 50s; I wouldn't wish it on my enemy.

Don't train to be a nurse because you can't be a doctor.

Either get in to medicine with all that entails or focus your efforts elsewhere.

This. I have two ND kids and managed reasonably until secondary school. Now pretty well a full time career for one of them as they dropped out of secondary and LA cannot find a school able to meet needs.

You literally only live once, if you can afford it and feel that you can manage the workload and get a place on a course, go for it! Only you know your limits and capabilities. Think of that experience that you would bring to your role and also you clearly have the science knowledge.

Exactly, you only live once. Don't waste it on this folly. What about being an PA?

I think you should look closely at physiotherapy, potentially with a view to working either in neurosciences or respiratory physiotherapy. If you want problem-solving, responsible work, high patient contact, intellectual demand... it has it all. (I'm not a physio BTW!)

Are you ready for 5 years of studying followed by two years of being a foundation dr having to get multiple assignments completed whilst juggling busy ward rounds/duties/nights.

are you prepared to have to up sticks and move across the country like I did when I started my specialty training.I did not have family/kids to factor in and I found it hard.

are you prepared to have to move every 6 months within the deanery often travelling to work in the morning up to and over 50 miles (at one point I commuted between Birmingham and Stoke almost daily)

are you prepared to be heavily scrutinised and criticised during training especially if taking on a surgical specialty. Spend ours of simulator training before being allowed to work on actual people but also perfecting your skills.

are you prepared to spend thousands on exams with the added stress of not passing within the designated number of attempts (usually 4) and possibly having to exit the specialty training program if you do not.

are you prepared to spend hours researching/literature searching and writing publications only for them to be peer reviewed and require a further hours and hours of revision to publish. You cant get a decent consultant post without them.

are you prepared to pay 100s for membership (GMC 420 BMA 400 medical defence 500+ ) to various professional bodies as well as royal college member ship (600) plus many others for the privilege of keeping abreast of new developmemts and some are compulsory.

are you prepared to spend 1000s on attending conferences each year often abroad to attain the 50 cpd points one needs as a consultant.

are you prepared to spend hours on audit/constantly reviewing your practice or spending your time on countless quality improvement projects to justify your SPA time.

are you prepared to be scrutinised, criticised by management, micromanaged and constantly told you are not doing enough.

are you prepared for the anxiety, the imposter syndrome often faced by senior female Drs and surgeons.

a short summary of what you may face…

I’d like to add - while I think retraining in medicine would put you/family under too much pressure, I think you should definitely explore other options that may be open to you, that may also include further / specialist study (albeit much much shorter and / or more flexible than medicine… so, taking your qualifications and experience as a starting point, and seeing what you can bolt on or use as a spring board to take it in a different direction… sideways and upwards.. Eg there are some masters degrees that can be very flexible / part-time / online, so you can accommodate your dcs needs more easily. I sympathise a lot - and would dearly love to strike out in a different direction myself - but that is not really possible for me at the moment (but maybe in a year or so!). Whatever you choose to do, I wish you the best of luck.

Have you checked to see if any Uk medical schools will accept your 20 year old biology degree as an entry requirement? They usually want evidence of “ recent study “ which is within 5 years.

So you might need to do some more qualifications first, plus work experience / shadowing and get a good score in GAMSAT / UCAT.

I also see that you’ve been a SAHP for the last 6 years. I assume that’s because of the level of needs of your children. So how will that work when you are a full time student, perhaps at a university several hours away?

You say that your husband will support you, which is great . But I’m not clear if you mean financially - in which case who will care for your children while you are working and living at the other end of the country ? He can’t be working FT to support the famIly home /your studies and accommodation t the same time as being a FT SAHP to your two ND children.

Or if he is giving up his job to care for the children, how will you all pay the bills?

I'm now wondering what on earth I was thinking with this 🤣 I must have been feeling freakishly optimistic this afternoon!

No way I'd do this!! My kids are my world. Thank you for all your advice regarding other potential careers. Lots to think about and I need to work out if retraining is something I can realistically do.