Any nurses out there who have retrained as doctors?

[iamabadger]

Title kind of says it all! I secretly wanted to be a doctor as a teenager, but due to various reasons (mainly confidence and a chaotic home life with little support and encouragement) I foolishly didn't pursue it. I love nursing, but still hanker after doing medicine. So just wanted some opinions/advice really as it would be such a big step, I have been a nurse for five years now, and have progressed through bands fairly quickly.

I've considered it but due to the fact as a med student, F1, F2, even a registrar you get moved around so many different hospitals I'm trying to forget it. Couldn't cope with the commute to some of the hospitals I'd be sent to. DH wouldn't want to move, wouldn't be fair on DD.

You can do a 4 year graduate entry course if you have a degree already. Some med schools offer this option, not all do. Good luck if you go for it.

It is something I really want to do, will hopefully do 4 year course when the kids are older.
I'm sure in America, nursing counts as credit towards medical degree and you don't have to start in 1st year.

Well I'm lucky in that I don't have children yet, which is why I don't want to leave it much later if I'm going to do it. Already I'm starting to feel too settled to change careers, so can see it would be so much harder to make the jump post-children. Still such a massive decision though! I've seen at least one course that accepts the DipHe in nursing if you've been working more tha two years.

Would you be able to put up with the on-call, that's what puts most off I'm told.

I'd want to be a hospital Dr, so no on-call. Just shifts, the same as I work at the minute. Most GPs don't do on call either.

I have worked with the mature medical students at St Georges in London. They were great, asked really good questions and had the maturity to take advantage of all opportunities. I'd go for it. The worst that could happen is that you do a year or two, decide it's not for you and could return to nursing.

The only experience I have is working in an NHS hospital as a secretary, working for various specialty teams. Amongst those teams were a couple of nurse specialists and I did wonder about one of them (given the level of her knowledge and expertise) whether she might once have wanted to train to be a doctor but circumstances didn't permit that.

You'd have some things going for you already: you'll have the medical knowledge you've already acquired, plus an awareness of what working in a hospital is like, and how to deal with patients and their relatives and other hospital staff. It could be as daunting on your first rotation as the other students because you'd have a different role/responsibilities, but you wouldn't be in an unfamiliar environment.

I'd suggest at least taking your ambition further and make enquiries, especially at the med school that accepts the DipHe as an acceptable prerequisite.

I teach medical students and each year a few are people who previously worked as Nurses, Teachers and, memorably, a professional violinist. They seem uniformly very good/excellent. I would do it, if you think it is for you...