Choosing a Medical Specialty - What You DON'T Think About

I've wanted to make a video like this for a long time. In this video, I wanted to discuss choosing a medical specialty and why it's so important. There are a lot of different things to consider when picking a medical specialty, and these are a few of the things that probably aren't talked about that much. Maybe this will help people who are finishing up with med school and in the process of choosing a specialty. Let me know if this is helpful!

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#medicalspecialty #choosingaspecialty #career

[InformalGreeting]

I see several med students in the comments. You don’t know me so take this for what it is worth. But if you are undecided on what you want to do internal medicine is the answer. Tons of sub specialties that can allow you to go any direction. And it opens the door to the best job in medicine. Hospitalists tend to be scheduled for 14-16 shifts per month. On paper those shifts are 10-12 hours. In reality if you aren’t on call many of those days may be 4-5 hours. The pay isn’t neurosurgeon money but dollar per hour worked is hard to top. $300, 000 for 180 days worked with the bulk of those being half days is a great life.

[SillyBilly]

Great video! I really really wanted to do Radiology, ironically, as soon as I hit my mid 30s, multiple sclerosis shut me out. I encourage my friends to do what they want to do today, because we don't know what tomorrow has in store for us.

[hollyc]

I’m so glad to see a doctor who has finished training discuss these topics. Most Med students don’t think about what their lives may look like years into practice. I gave this info as a talk to pre-Med students (because I knew everyone else would focus on how to get into Med school) and they seemed to find it useful. I know we never thought much about lifestyle or hours as students. We chose specialties that were liked. It wasn’t until we had kids that the realization of what shift work would look like to the children, if one of us were doing 3 mid shifts in a row, the kids in school would go several days without seeing us. It was quite a wake up call. Great content and congratulations on being out in practice!

[edwmac]

I didn’t really decide to go into medicine. I decided to go into Pediatrics. I never wanted to take care of adults. That 210K number for Pediatricians includes a lot of part time doctors. I work full time and do quite well. I do take call but if you love your job, it’s not a big deal. Pediatricians do work into their 70’s traditionally. We love what we do so we don’t want to retire. Pediatricians have the lowest suicide rate of all physicians. I never hear Pediatricians yelling at each other. I can’t say that for other specialties. Our specialty is full of idealists. The idea that a physician should be aiming to retire in their 50’s sounds like this guy is the worst kind of doctor. Make as much money as possible and get out. Any doctor working at his craft should be at the height of their skills at that age. Why retire when you have the most to offer? I’m 67, having the time of my life and hope to work another 13 years, assuming my brain is functioning well.

[yeehawtomahawk]

It makes me sad that doctors who choose to specialize in anything pediatrics make less than if they did the same thing for adults

[funsize]

great advice Doc. As a non traditional guy medstudent myself, I narrowed down my specialties based on what I can keep doing when older and with kids.

[wspeer]

Intraspecialty salary differences typically are more than interspecialty salary differences, which isn't mentioned in the video. This is important to keep in mind when choosing a specialty.

[MFD-Jt]

Great video.. The lack of call and ability to practice anywhere was a huge reason I decided on psychiatry. It's also incredibly easy to go part time and work as long as you want. Some surgical specialties as you age you just might not be capable of the work anymore

[Zephyr]

Hi Dr. Cellini! Since rank list submissions are coming up soon, could you do a video on tips and considerations when ranking residency programs (especially for people with partners, SOs)? Thanks for your insightful work!

[dudedelrey]

Starting MS1, this came at a perfect time for me :) Trying to keep my mind open going forward but have been leaning towards surgery since I can remember. Thank you Dr. Cellini!

[kylehrabovsky]

Would love to hear you talk about what you liked about going to an osteopathic med school, and how that had a role in you choosing your specialty and if it made it any more difficult.

[joshmcgoo]

I applied for EM in the match right now (time flies) and I feel like people don't realize the income differences WITHIN a specialty vary much more than between specialties. Sure, Derm > peds for income. But...

Things like academic FM makes MUCH less than private care/nocturnist FM. There are so many ways to bolster your clinical income if you're willing to go off the beaten path a bit.

[kfcm]

I love your more frequent posts and I love seeing your brother. My husband of 35 years is a Veterinarian, so I am very very interested in listening to both of y’all. I was born in and have lived in Georgia all my life.

[GG-yyyx]

Since I️ started watching your videos in late 2019/early 2020, I’ve gone through a crazy rollercoaster. But since I’ve applied and just got accepted to my top choice school. So this video came at such a good time. Now that I️ start med school in the fall, I️ really wanted to start navigating specialty decision making processes.

[jsWarrior]

Thanks for the advice! Non traditional OMSII here. These are all the same reasons why I'm pretty set on DR/IR. Thanks for reinforcing my choice!

[gil]

Great video. MS3 applying later this year, these are pretty much the points I'm deciding on now. Between ortho vs anesthesia vs rads. I genuinely like all of them enough to do them, at this point trying to figure out what will I will be happiest doing when I have kids or am 50. Seems like anesthesia and rads on average get way more vacation time and have the ability to scale back way easier than ortho, which as someone who wants to travel and fully or partially retire early, really has me leaning towards them (even though if I'm being honest ortho is my favorite).

[nycdwellerfornow]

Thanks for the thoughtful breakdown--location constraints are definitely not something I've thought much about (though fortunately, for now at least, I like cities). Work-life balance I think is the most important consideration for me at least, and some may say don't go into medicine if you like to have a healthy work-life balance, but I don't think that's really fair, evidenced by people like you.

[nickdenezza]

Fantastic advice! Especially thinking about what you want to be doing not just now, but also at age 50.

[empyrealsaturn]

The part about age at the end is very true. I'm not allowed to sit down at my job, and I can be on my feet for over 11 hours per shift. I've already developed some rather bothersome back pain a couple years into the job. Just grocery shopping hurts now, too, sometimes very badly. I'm not even in my 30s. I have a sit-stand desk, but I never even use it properly because it just hurts to stand up for long at all. I'm uncertain I can stick with this career in the long term. It wasn't something I really thought would be so bad until I was in the thick of it, and I didn't think it would happen to me so soon.

[draconiusultamius]

Yeah, I still don't see myself doing anything but surgery. The OR is the best place in the hospital, away from all the congested hallways and scary medicine people that can vomit up a textbook of material at any given moment. It's also so satisfying to watch operations occur and I love it.