How hard is it to be a doctor?

How hard is Medical School after you get accepted? Seriously. I want to be a doctor.?

• Can someone please explain some things, not only to me, but the rest of the future potential doctors reading this. How hard is Medical School? I don't mean the crazy studying and sleep schedules, I understand that's given, I'm talking about the flood of information in such a short amount of time. The thought of it just seems astronomical. I've looked at every curriculum for every kind of doctor and trust me, I've not seen one yet that looked easy. I think I have an exceptional, partly eidetic memory, but I haven't went up against anything such as med school. I think if you have what it takes to get accepted, you have what it takes to get through. It just seems like a lot, that I'm going to someday complete. After graduation with an MD degree, a resident training must take place. - is resident training competitive like med school? -does your residency training decide what part of medicine you practice? - If so, can you get stuck doing something you didn't want to do? - Is there classwork involved in resident training? What happens if you fail at this point? Just general questions about becoming a doctor if anyone would like to contribute, preferably a doctor, it would be greatly appreciated. Thank you. All of this is assuming all boards and state licensing requirements are met.

• Answer:

  No, none of them are easy. The traditional comparison is that the information coming in is like trying to drink from a fire hose. Part of the solution is studying a lot and keeping up (cramming will not work in med school), but honestly, part of it--often the scariest part for people who are used to doing very very well in school--is realizing that you just aren't going to learn all of it the first time around. And that's okay. Getting a few wrong is expected. It's one of the hardest parts for med students to deal with, I think--they came from high schools where they were easily at the top of their class, then went to colleges where they were still among the elite scholastically, and now everyone around them is in that same demographic. *Everyone* can learn easily and quickly and it's harder to stand out. But it really doesn't matter--all you have to do is get through it, and you all have to find a way to do it. The smartest people learned to do it together. Anyway, residency. Getting a residency is sometimes competitive--some residencies are more competitive than others. Yes, your residency training determines your specialty--that is when you decide it, and yes, there are people who don't get into a residency in their first choice of specialty. You can wind up doing something you didn't want to do. Some people reapply in later years--I personally know a girl who wanted orthopedic surgery badly enough to take a prelim surgery year with no guarantee of a placement, go on to a year of anesthesia, and then finally match into ortho after that. Sometimes it's pure drive and determination. There is some classwork in residency the sense of daily conferences and lectures. There's usually a yearly standardized exam of some kind. It is possible to fail out of residency, although to be honest, you would have to really be trying to fail. You can't practice independently without completing a residency, so you wouldn't be able to get a job as a doctor. If you've made it that far, though, generally they will try and help you through whatever difficulty you're having. Actually, the same goes for med school, although people do fail out of med school regularly. I don't know anyone who was asked to leave residency. I know people who were put on probation or who had to repeat years of residency, though. Still. Worry about med school first. ;) Good luck!