How to get good healthcare, Part VI

The hierarchy continued:

After the first year of internship, the intern becomes a full fledged resident. The residency usually lasts three or four years after 8 years of college and medical school. In the case of some surgical specialties, residency can take the better part of a decade. It’s hard work and because of the long malignant history of medical education, residency can have a seriously deleterious effect on the ego. So if you really want to alienate somebody who can be an important advocate for you, call your resident a med student. Residencies are done in specialties like Surgery or Pediatrics. After residency, the doctor will want to take an exam to become “board certified” in their specialty. Hopefully, your doctor will be board certified once they have finished training.

Once done with residency, the doctor might go on to complete a fellowship to gain further sub-specialty training. For example, the Internal Medicine resident may do a fellowship in Cardiology. They may then sit for their board exam in that subspecialty. All told, a highly trained physician may be in his or her 30’s or even 40’s before they start making real money. Unless daddy’s real rich, they will be broke and tired. They may even have a family with the aforementioned nurse by now, so hopefully the nurse kept their job. Nurses make good money.