Leaving finance for medicine

So I have reached a point in my career where I am seriously considering waving goodbye to finance and going back to train to become a doctor.

I’m early 30’s, $150k all in per annum income and have a pretty cushy/interesting corp dev role.
This is not driven by any gripe with my current situation. Things are pretty good for me right now but I have always had a niggling desire to do medicine and keep telling myself to hang on and see where the finance route takes me.

I realise that it is very unlikely I will ever make more money in medicine compared to the track I am currently on. That’s not what’s motivating me. I also realise that I will be mid to late 40s by the time I get to where I want to be.

What’s ultimately driving the decision is that as I have gotten older, money beyond a certain level has become less and less important to me. I ultimately find the role I am in (and finance in general) to be personally unfulfilling for me. I basically asked myself what would I do if money was no object and the answer is become a doctor.
So I was wondering anybody else ever heard of somebody doing something like this? I know it is very late and it will be a very difficult road but would love to hear peoples thoughts.

 
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Hippocrates:
So I have reached a point in my career where I am seriously considering waving goodbye to finance and going back to train to become a doctor.

I’m early 30’s, $150k all in per annum income and have a pretty cushy/interesting corp dev role. This is not driven by any gripe with my current situation. Things are pretty good for me right now but I have always had a niggling desire to do medicine and keep telling myself to hang on and see where the finance route takes me.

I realise that it is very unlikely I will ever make more money in medicine compared to the track I am currently on. That’s not what’s motivating me. I also realise that I will be mid to late 40s by the time I get to where I want to be.

What’s ultimately driving the decision is that as I have gotten older, money beyond a certain level has become less and less important to me. I ultimately find the role I am in (and finance in general) to be personally unfulfilling for me. I basically asked myself what would I do if money was no object and the answer is become a doctor. So I was wondering anybody else ever heard of somebody doing something like this? I know it is very late and it will be a very difficult road but would love to hear peoples thoughts.

I have considered it strongly.

What is your undergrad major? If you have some exposure to the pre-reqs in undergrad it would be good. You're probably going to have to take the pre-req courses again even if you took them ten years ago. Do you have a good undergrad GPA?

Also, you might think about starting to get some experience at a hospital. Even one day a week to start will be good exposure for you, not only for your application, but to get a feel what it is like to deal with patients on a regular basis.

It is going to be a difficult road and an expensive one. Between post-bacc courses and med school costs, its likely going to be mid six figures for expenses. Do you know where you want to take the pre-reqs or do your post-bacc?

"If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." - Bruce Lee
 

Hi Isaiah,

I should have mentioned, my situation is a little different because I am not in the US.

This means the system is completely different but suffice to say it would involve me entering a 5 year degree course which I should be able to do if I want to. The all in cost for this would be substantially less than it would cost in the states and I could cover it from savings.

The big hit for me here is the opportunity cost.

 

Hello! Cryo-freezing is really a miracle, I was shocked when I learned about this procedure and that our medicine is capable of it, I personally used the services of ARK.Cryo and I want to note the quality of work done, they did everything just at the highest level and I now always recommend everyone who has any problems that can solve this company, several of my friends have used their services

 

Right now ortho or cardio-thoracic surgery are the fields I find most interesting (which I realise are two of the toughest paths).

I think helping people is definitely a big part of it but another part of it for me is the continuous learning and improving knowledge over the career as well as the ability to undertake research. The human body (and science in general) also fascinates me.

 

No interest in preventative medicine? It's not gonna just kill your soul to operate on people eating themselves to death every day?

heister: Look at all these wannabe richies hating on an expensive salad. https://arthuxtable.com/
 

Have you considered that asking advice on how to become a doctor on a finance forum isn't exactly the right way to start...?

In my country medicine is a minimum of 7+ years studying ( 4,5 years full time studying and 2,5+ years paid internships), good luck.

 

I used to be a med student but switched to study finance after a year. Got a good exposure to this world as I had a bunch of friends working as doctors and also had to go to hospitals and help surgeons out during procedures. (Not seriously, kinda like standing there and doing some really simple task if they asked me to do it) This helped me realise that being a doctor is just like another job. Yes you help people more than in other professions but it isn't going to define your life, make it more fulfilling or just make you a better person. If you believe so then you might be in for a rude awakening(just like many med student). I would suggest to think carefully about this. Are you sure that working 24 hour shifts, taking on enormous debt, and probably being underpaid for quite some time will make your life better? If you feel that being a doc would truly make your life more fulfilling then it could turn out to be a great choice. However, if it is something else that you are missing from life then this decision could just make you miserable. In my case I realised that being a doctor is interesting and cool but not necessary for me to be where I want to be in life/ to have a meaningful life, where I m contributing to the well-being of others around me.

 

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