by Nigel Hilton
Image source Pixabay - CC0 Licence
You may have dreamed about being a doctor since you were a child. If you have always harbored thoughts of entering the medical profession and you are eager to whip on a white coat and carry around a stethoscope, you need to consider your options if you are a school leaver. The chances are the most direct route for you will be to go to medical school. The same applies to those individuals who are career switchers. Your experience as an accountant, an architect or a marketing executive counts for nothing. You will need to start at the same entry point as every other potential doctor. Read on to discover if you have what it takes to become a doctor.
Commitment And Study
Before you even set foot in a hospital, you will need to endure years of study and you will have to commit to funding your course in which case, apply for scholarships like the scholarship offered by dr timothy steel. Medical school is tough and completing a degree in medicine is one of the toughest you can endure. You will have lab tests, experiments, exams and coursework to complete as well as extra shadowing of professionals and learning key medical concepts. Applying this later when working in a hospital requires exceptional time management and organization skills. Just because you might have the grades to get onto a course, doesn’t mean that you have the commitment and work ethic to ensure that you graduate with flying colors.
Empathy
While nurses tend to be the healthcare professionals that work with patients on a more pastoral and personal level, doctors still become attached to the people under their care. This is only natural and not necessarily a negative thing. You need to care about the people you are trying to make better. Showing empathy helps you to understand your patients’ motivations and can help you establish a trusting relationship with them. However, you do need to set boundaries. The outcome you seek from treatment plans will not always come to fruition and you will have to endure days of loss and sadness. It’s vital that you can compartmentalize this and work professionally the following day when you are back at work.
Private Practice
Once you have worked in a hospital for some time and you have found your feet within the medical sphere, you might be keen to start your own practice. This can be exciting. However, you are now responsible for a whole lot more than just treating sick patients. You’ll have to obtain insurances, find a premises, lease equipment and decide what sort of medical software you will use. When writing patient letters or reports, you need medical voice recognition software to help streamline your admin tasks. You need to keep your clerical duties organized and maintain a sterile, clean and healthy working environment for all in your care.
Being a doctor is much more than administering treatment. You need to be a consummate professional and be willing to put in the hard work to ensure you become the best doctor you can be.