Excuse Busters
There may be obstacles to becoming
a physician, but they shouldn’t stop anyone from
pursuing medicine, according to these
“nontraditional” physicians.
“ I’m too old to
change careers ”
While this may have been an
acceptable attitude 30 or 40 years ago, these days
people change careers in their 30s, 40s, and 50s.
According to Leslie Brott, MD, 41, who practices family
medicine at Physicians’ Medical Center in
McMinnville, Oregon, “It’s taken a lot of
work, time, and money, but if I hadn’t done it, I
would probably be bored and restless as well as older
anyway!”
“ I’m too old to
become a doctor ”
You’re going to be older
someday anyway, so why not work at a career you love?
“After my husband’s death, I decided I
would not spend the rest of my days in front of a
computer analyzing pay data,” says Deborah
Clements, MD, an associate professor and the associate
program director in the department of family medicine
at the University of Kansas Medical Center. “For
me, the choice was about following my passion and
making the most of my life.”
“ It costs too much money to
go to medical school ”
This is true, but you can take
loans and get scholarships, and as a physician,
you’ll have the earning power to pay back the
loans eventually. “I thought about this before I
made the decision to make the commitment to
medicine,” says Clements. “If the choice to
work in medicine is about money for anyone, it’s
the wrong choice.”
“ I don’t have a
science background. My former career was in a
completely different field than medicine ”
People go into medicine from
fields as diverse as law, finance, and teaching. You
can always catch up on the science you missed the first
time around. “It’s do-able,” says
Brott, a history major in college. “A lack of a
science background is not a barrier to entering
medicine. You just have to do it.”
David Krol, MD, the
vice president of medical affairs for The
Children’s Health Fund in New York City and a
former professional baseball player, majored in biology
in college yet had to bone up on science before
applying to medical school. “I didn’t take
my MCAT until after my playing days were over (five
years after freshman biology and chemistry), [so] I had
to re-learn all of that stuff.” g
