DS keen on being doctor - advice welcomed!

[sydenhamhiller]

Hoping, as ever, Mumsnet can give its usual sage advice.

We are not a family of medics - DH and I are first gen of our families to go to Uni, and have Arts degrees.

DC1 is at a boys' grammar, and is a good all-rounder. He'd say his favourite subjects are PE, Latin and English in that order. He has just started doing the 3 separate sciences this school year (Y9), and quite likes them, but sadly (understandably with current teaching crisis) not the best teachers.

And to our surprise, since last year he's quite set on being a doctor. We're not quite sure where this came from - as I mentioned above, we're not a 'medic' family. The two doctors and one nurse we know have (again, understandably) a jaundiced view of the NHS. The news is full of the low morale and difficult working conditions in the NHS. We've discussed this with him.

All the posts on mumsnet/ articles elsewhere seem to say, in a nutshell, don't send your children to med school, counsel them to do something else. So should I be doing that?

When I discuss this with him - bless him, he's only 13 - he says 'well, you and dad are always going on about how difficult it is, and how hard I'll work, and how everyone hates it, I KNOW', and then I feel a bit bad for questioning his idealistic young dream.

I am also aware of being a helicopter parent. I don't think my parents even knew which 5 Unis I had on my UCAS form, or what I wrote in my personal statement! But it's such a competitive course, for so many years, such low morale on here/ the media, I just want him to make an informed decision and I am not sure how I do that. If it was 20 years ago, I'd say, "you love Latin, go and do classics somewhere", but with 3 kids, and crazy fees, I am not sure that is a luxury we can afford to promote...

Any advice lovely Secondary Education posters?

Thanks again for all the additional comments since I last checked.

Jamesforsythe - that’s lots of helpful information, thank you, you and your wife are well placed! I just wondered if possibly you had mis-typed regarding the required A levels for imperial and Oxbridge (amongst others) being Chemistry and Maths. I had - anecdotally I realised - been told that it should be Chemistry and Biology and at least one other. I just double checked the Imperial admissions page and it states:

“subject and grade requirements (2018 entry)
We expect applicants for 2018 entry to meet the following grade requirements in these subjects:

A* in Chemistry or Biology
A in the remaining subject from Chemistry or Biology
A in a third subject”

I think you should encourage him to follow his dreams. He's very young and may well decide it's not for him. He might not achieve the faded he needs at gcse. But I think it's great he's got an idea in mind for what he wants to do.

Yes, my apologies. My wife has just pointed out to me I had mis-stated the requirement.

However, Maths A level grade A/A* is not merely (usually) going to impress more than any other third subject, the maths A level might well prove more useful because of relevance of content to modern aspects of medicine. That said, as long as his maths is very good, it's entirely unto him. A grade B in GCSE maths is a red flag, as even basic medical school statistics and data interpretation will demand a more developed maths ability than that implies.

Best to your son.
James.

It's good to hear that a youngster has aspirations. I would say that if he finds it interesting and mentally stimulating then it is not a bad one to consider and work towards, if he doesn't like it he could always switch to something else but it would be harder to do the other way round..
Ultimately it is definitely a good career in terms of job stability however I don't think doctors earn a lot at all. The huge responsibilities that come with the job and the staggering amount of hours that we do actually make us massively underpaid. Very few specialities make big bucks in the uk. I guess money isn't everything though.