Medical student loans top hundreds of thousands of dollars, so it’s understandable that physicians may want to select a specialty that pays well.
But overwhelmingly, the physicians Medscape spoke to said they chose a specialty they were passionate about rather than focusing on going where more money was. Moreover, most advised young doctors to follow their hearts rather than their wallets.
"There is no question that many young kids immediately think about money when deciding to pursue medicine, but the thought of a big paycheck will never sustain someone long enough to get them here," says Sergio Alvarez, MD, a board-certified plastic surgeon based in Miami, Florida, and the CEO and medical director of Mia Aesthetics, which has several national locations.
"Getting into medicine is a long game, and there are many hurdles along the way that only the dedicated overcome," says Alvarez.
Unfortunately, he says it may be late in that long game before some realizes that the pay rate for certain specialties isn't commensurate with the immense workload and responsibility they require.
"The short of it is that to become a happy doctor, medicine really needs to be a calling: a passion! There are far easier things to do to make money."
