Reasons for joy: A reminder of the 10 classic reasons it's great to be a doctor

We at the Medical Post Googled up all the lists we could find of why being a doctor is a good gig, and from those lists narrowed it down to the top 10 reasons that seemed to come up again and again. Then we asked a few physicians at various stages of their careers for their anonymous input. #1 You can really help people You can change people’s lives. One of the doctors we spoke to said, “There’s something magical and special that we truly get to be part of people’s very intimate experiences and lives.” Indeed, it is a special connection that doctors have with patients and their families. Still another doctor noted that this idea that one is always “helping” people can be overplayed: Most patients need far less “help” than they think and actually changing lives happens less often than one would hope for. #2 You get to use science every day “It’s an evidence-based discipline,” said one physician, “but we also have the ability to critically think and integrate evidence with the patient in front of us.” Still other doctors we spoke to were a little cynical arguing one only uses science every day if one engages in the process. You have to pay attention for this to be true, another doctor noted, arguing that most of the job is pattern recognition and rhetoric. #3 There are so many career paths It depends how you see it: Some say this is a profession where one has lots of ability to “tailor our job/career to what we are passionate about.” “There is the ability to retool,” one doctor said. Others scoff, saying there are not a lot of career paths in medicine: “Hard to get into a residency, hard to change, can’t retrain, and very hard to get a job outside medicine later—investment was too big going in and very hard to shake the label going out (‘Do we really need a doctor for this position?’).” #4 Get to use hands-on skills Sure, kinesthetic pleasure is a major factor for many, and its loss—for various reasons, particularly during the pandemic—is a cause of boredom and burnout in primary care. #5 People (mostly) respect doctors This one really took a hit in the past two years, one doctor observed. But the doctors we spoke to said this is still largely true, although some had provisos about certain groups of patients these days. #6 Job stability and decent income This is how one physician put it: You will always have work, it will usually pay for a decent education for your kids, and for the most part you should be able to find stability. But not always! #7 Critical thinking and problem-solving every day This dovetails with #2: using science. But the counterpoint is: Expertise should be boring; you should have seen the same problem 1,000 times. “Docs follow patterns, and some have very weak (shockingly weak) critical thinking skills,” one said. #8 Patient care is fascinating You get to meet people from all sorts of backgrounds—different ages, cultures and professions—which is pretty unique to medicine, one doctor noted, as most other professional fields tend to work with a similar demographic. #9 Opportunity to teach This can be fun, no doubt. It makes you feel wise/experienced/smart. #10 You are your own boss This may be especially true if you are fee-for-service (FFS). As one doctor noted: “For those of us in FFS, we set our own hours (too much), we set the numbers of patients we see (too many), and decide how many years we work (too long).” But in general, physicians have more autonomy than many other workers.

Reasons for joy: A reminder of the 10 classic reasons it's great to be a doctor

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