QUOTE(nagasawa @ Oct 23 2008, 07:04 PM) [snapback]3980416[/snapback]
I've talked to a lot of nurses and they seemed to be doing pretty well in all sorts of fields ranging from psych and ICU to emergency room. I was especially drawn to the whole, 3 12-hour shifts a week, which means 4 days off! i've never seen anything so flexible in my life. 
I used to think nursing was a dead end until I saw you could indeed specialize plus you can go to med school and have the benefit of financing your own education due to a relatively decent nursing salary.
I have heard nothing good about PA however. I've usually had it described as 4 years to be an amateur doctor.
I used to think nursing was a dead end until I saw you could indeed specialize plus you can go to med school and have the benefit of financing your own education due to a relatively decent nursing salary.
I have heard nothing good about PA however. I've usually had it described as 4 years to be an amateur doctor.
Nursing is definitely no dead end. There's so many options to it. You can specialize, get your masters, teach, blah blah blah. And yes, you're not coming out of med school with a huge loan over your head.
I work my 9-5 at an outpatient clinic right now, and I love my hours. I love that I can leave when it's time to leave, and have no obligations after my shift. I used to date a doctor for quite a few years, and it sucked to get the $hit-end of the stick, when we're supposed to be having a quite evening to ourselves and he's checking his labs and patients. Didn't appreciate that one bit, and would hate to inflict that on someone else.
I've heard the same about PA's. I have looked into being a nurse practioner, however, and with a certain health care company (the one I'm working for now), it doesn't seem to be that bad. They do almost the same exact thing as MD's, but can't perform surgery, and have to have a minimal portion of their charts reviewed by MD's.
How far into pre-med are you?

