You may have trouble remembering this, if you’re constantly working odd shifts and long hours. But there’s a whole big wide world outside the walls of your workplace. In recent weeks, I’ve made adventurous inroads (this is hyperbole) into new areas – the suburbs surrounding my hospital and various random spots in my city to which I’ve never before been. Do you know what is amazing about this? Cruising down unknown streets and new stretches of clogged-up Sydney traffic is actually very freeing when it’s an entirely new experience. And this exploration can serve as a metaphor for those of you who may feel trapped by your present work environment.
We started this little online space two years ago (two whole years ago!!) as a way to support our colleagues and peers in what can sometimes be an isolating career. We also wanted a space that could open minds to new ideas and remind people of there previously creative selves. So this post is dedicated to careers in medicine that are outside of your typical view.
Medical school tailored our learning to the main hospital specialties – physicians, surgery, obstetrics & gynaecology, paediatrics, psychiatry, emergency, intensive care, and anaesthetics – and general practice. Oddly enough, three specialties integral to hospital medicine were barely, if at all, covered: radiology, pathology, and medical administration. For the other AHPRA-recognised specialties – public health, occupational medicine, addiction medicine, palliative care, radiation oncology, sexual health, sports medicine – there was barely a look in.
Medical school also did not reveal to me the numerous “other paths” one could follow if none of those (quite varied) clinical specialties didn’t quite suit. A degree in medicine is not a one way ticket to clinical work; there is a multitude of alternatives. Entrepreneur, geneticist, pharmaceutical researcher, medico-legal advisor, educator, data scientist, medical photographer, and health journalist are all possibilities for which your degree prepares you. There are also plenty of ways to spread your wings while remaining in clinical practice – event volunteer doctor, overseas volunteer, military medicine, sports event assistant, assistant to TV dramas … the list goes on.
There is, of course, nothing wrong with clinical medicine. I just remind you because I wonder if our colleagues and friends who have lost themselves along the way, and who we have lost, could remember that there is a life outside the hospital. There are other options. If being a physician registrar exhausts you, or even if being a consultant bores you, there are other alternatives. You have not signed away the rest of your life to this career. If you wish to be a cardiologist until the end of your days, wonderful! If you want to try your hand at all types of clinical medicine as a CMO, great! If you want to take a break to explore how environmental pathogens affect long-term health outcomes in regions around coal energy plants, excellent! There is always a career, and a life, out there for you.
If you could do anything, would this be the path you’d choose?
Maybe you are this curious kangaroo…
