[Recom.org] So, Why Study Medicine?

flibbertigibbet wrote:
Not all people study medicine because of the glamour and money often associated with the course. So far, I have met a few decent doctors who really care for their patients. They never charge their patients high consultation fees and don't live a luxurious lifestyle. They are the REAL doctors.

We always hear about people using the word "desperate" on someone else with a negative connotation. And then the person would frantically deny the "accusation". But if we lay back and think, what's wrong with being desperate, especially at the age of 20s? Doesn't everyone want to be loved and have the chance to love someone else, doesn't everyone wish to have someone to be alongside you when you are lonely? Aren't everyone on the Earth desperate for love? As long as you don't go all out to game with love, why can't we be desperate?

You might think that I have already gone to the wrong thread, don't you? No, just change the word "desperate" to "hoping for glamour and status by becoming a doctor". What's wrong with taking up medicine with the hope of gaining social status? You might well argue that when the urge to be important supplants the real passion and drive to help others, you become a "bad" doctor, I know. But that is only if someone wants to be important and can't care less about his passion, and you know, this is not always true. The urge to become important, admit it or not, is one of the dominant factors why people first take up medicine. For one of our lectures, they started it up by saying, "you know what social status you are on when you become a doctor?". And you get the answer directly - a big, straight index finger. And I am not trying to exaggerate here, but almost everyone in the lecture theatre gleamed with pride. You can see what drive them (or rather, us).

I think that you don't blame people for taking up medicine simply because they want to be important. A psychologist (should be Sigmund Freud, but I am not sure) once said that the two most important instinctive desire of human being are the sexual desire and the desire to be recognized and acknowledged. I couldn't agree more. Whatever people say to lament status as a drive to people taking medicine, my bottomline is: As long as you have the passion and the urge to help people, why can't I go for glamour and status?