advice

Strangely, people have started to contact me for advice about the MD/PhD program and mathematical biology.

Things I wish I had known about internal medicine/surgery:

- Do you like decision making with imperfect information, little time, and high stakes?
- Being able to save lives means often being in a position to LOSE lives
- Do you like being around sick people and their families?
- Are you okay with inflicting pain on people?  Many procedures are painful.
- Do you like problem solving?  Medicine is full of problem-solving but not necessarily creativity
- How do you feel about working in a gigantic bureaucracy and mostly spending your time filling out paperwork?
- How do you feel about working evenings, weekends, and nights, possibly for the rest of your career?
- Are you okay with triaging?
- How is your organization and time management?  Internal medicine is mostly about a series of small irritating tasks that must be done and less about patient care and diagnosis

You should consider medicine with the same seriousness that you would consider joining the military.  You won't kill people (intentionally, anyway), but you will see death, dying, and disability.  You will be changed.  And you don't want to go a couple hundred grand into debt in order to find out you don't like it.

- Your priorities will change. 

I know that won't change your decision at 22, but leave space for yourself to have different priorities and want different things out of life at 32.