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Feature: Career Advice So you want to be a doctor...
The practice of medicine is a distinguished and rewarding profession a young person can choose. If you are inquisitive by nature and are fascinated with learning about the human body and how to treat diseases, then medicine is a field that offers tremendous opportunities to make a difference to humanity. It is not as simple as, like some people may think, donning a lab coat, flaunting a stethoscope and prescribing medicines.
Deciding on a career in medicine should not be taken lightly. Remember, it is a very intense degree course lasting at least five years, leading to a job where you have to work long hours and requires great dedication. So, before you opt for this profession, make sure that you have what it takes to be a physician and don’t be persuaded in choosing this field by others. Without a real passion for the subject, many students struggle to survive the demanding pre-clinical years.
In fact, it would be fair to say that even for the most motivated of students, it can be easy to lose sight of what you are studying for when trawling through mounds of anatomy, physiology and biochemistry revision.
Every day in communities around the country, doctors work in neighbourhood clinics, hospitals, and charitable organizations to care for people in need. However, it is not a profession for the squeamish or the fainthearted as it is a field where one has to deal with sick and often terminally ill patients. Being a doctor is hard work. It often means long hours and dealing with many different patients and issues all at the same time.
As a doctor one may have to deal with difficult situations such as explaining to a relative stranger that they have just been diagnosed with a horrible, progressive, debilitating disease or seeing people bleeding and screaming on their way to the emergency ward or an operation theatre. These are some of the ground realities that you have to take into consideration before pursuing a career in medicine.
Being a doctor is much more than attending medical college for a certain number of years to acquire certain skills and knowledge, prescribing pills and medicines. It is a unique degree in that it combines the art of communicating effectively with patients with the science of the workings of the human body. It is a lifelong calling that demands flexibility, sacrifice of personal time, interests and family time. Most doctors’ professional lives are filled with caring for people and continuously learning more about the human body. However, it is a rewarding profession provided one’s motive is to serve mankind and to utilize one’s knowledge and learning to ease their pain and suffering.
Once you have weighed the pros and cons of the medical profession, it is time to focus on the requisite academic path for becoming a physician. Studying biology, chemistry and life sciences subjects at the A levels or a pre-medical background at the Higher Secondary School Certificate/Intermediate level is recommended. Pre-med students need to excel in their academic training in order to be considered for admission at a leading medical school. However, admission in a medical college is not solely dependent on good grades anymore, but there is an entrance test for admission in medical colleges as well.
Generally, the medical or MBBS course consists of a period of time learning about the science of the human body in health and disease (the pre-clinical years) combined with a period of time (the clinical years) applying that knowledge when meeting patients. During the first year of MBBS, while studying about human anatomy, dissecting a human cadaver is an integral part of the medical curriculum.
In Pakistan medical education involves five years of intensive classroom and clinical study. Core courses cover topics such as: Gross Anatomy, Human Embryology, Behavioural Medicine, Medical Jurisprudence, Pathology, and Pharmacology, Gynaecology/ Obstetrics and so on, in addition to a new vocabulary of medical terms.
After completing the MBBS degree, graduates take one-year house job at a teaching hospital, in order to gain a more extensive hands-on clinical experience as a medical practitioner. Job openings for physicians lie in government and private hospitals, nursing homes, similar health facilities and as medical officers in various private and public sector organizations. However after graduation, one may chose to specialize in a particular discipline. Specialist physicians differ from general physicians in that they focus on treating a particular system or part of the body. They work together with general medical practitioners to ensure that patients receive treatment for specific medical problems as well as complete and comprehensive care throughout life.
Since the vast increase of medical knowledge and techniques makes it impossible for one doctor to know it all, so each one specializes in one discipline or goes in for super-specialization in a sub-speciality. Specialization is also where more money happens to be. While deciding on a field to specialize in it is wise to explore the work profile, the hours, anticipated demands for various specialities in the future, and not to forget, the opportunity to earn a good income. No better way to find out than to talk to these specialists and observe them at work under various conditions.
Medicine is a life-long commitment to life and the living. It offers the most satisfying rewards to those willing to dedicate themselves to rigorous training. Even without specialization, it can still be a rewarding career. The field of medicine is exciting and challenging. The use of new technology, drugs and equipment to cope with disease and illness is thrilling, yet medicine is also very routine and not always dramatic. It has its compensations — money for one, the possibility of saving lives, giving an option of an improved life and making a difference!
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