Exploring Alternative Medical Careers Beyond Clinical Practice
Doing an MBBS is an obvious route to becoming a doctor and starting clinical practice. However, a medical degree opens the road to many alternative careers within the medical field that are beyond clinical practice. These alternative paths lead to healthcare professions equally prestigious and respectful as clinical practice. There is no dearth of jobs in the healthcare field for students who wish to explore careers outside the clinic. If you are pursuing an MBBS or planning to start your medical degree program, this blog will help you broaden your horizons. You will learn about medical field careers that you can opt for after completing your MBBS.
Hospital Administration
Hospital administration is one of the rising medical field careers. It involves overseeing the daily operations of a hospital and engaging in strategic planning. Hospital administrators ensure that the hospital staff is adequately trained and the hospital facility meets the regulatory standards. As a hospital administrator, you may also oversee hospital finances and hire and train staff members. You will need a diploma or MBA in hospital and healthcare management to open the door to management careers within the medical field. If you are engaged in a senior position by the hospital management, you may also be involved in setting organizational goals and doing strategic planning. A hospital and healthcare manager’s role is one of the respected healthcare professions.
Public Healthcare
You can earn a qualification in public health and become eligible for public healthcare jobs in the healthcare field. After doing a master’s degree in public healthcare, you can opt for public healthcare professions. You may work as a health education specialist, epidemiologist, or medical and health services professional. Public health professionals find jobs in the healthcare field close to the grassroots. You will work with the government, international organizations like WHO, and NGOs on public healthcare projects. Your work may involve project management, policy development, and collecting and analyzing data for disease prevention. You can also enter public healthcare roles by earning specialist qualifications in nursing, biostatistics, environmental science, nutrition, etc.
Health Informatics
Health Informatics is a medical field that can lead to many exciting healthcare professions. Amidst the Data and AI revolution, medical field careers that involve data and AI are gaining momentum. Health Informatics is the use of data analysis in the healthcare industry. Improving patient care, preventing public health outbreaks, and making treatments more effective and accurate are at the heart of Health Informatics. Doing a master’s degree is a great way to start health informatics careers within the medical field. Professionally, you will be working on patient care portals, managing electronic medical records, personalizing treatments, improving medical technology, and making public health strategies. Your job roles may be health informatics specialist, data analyst, health informatics analyst, etc.
Healthcare Entrepreneurship
Healthcare entrepreneurship is one of the medical field careers that MBBS students can look forward to. Success as a healthcare entrepreneur begins by identifying the unfulfilled needs of the healthcare industry and finding innovative solutions to problems. Ideally, healthcare entrepreneurship requires business acumen but knowledge of the medical field and technology are equally important. As an entrepreneur, you will work on developing novel solutions to problems in the healthcare industry. Developing medical devices, telemedicine platforms, and healthcare apps are the popular options for healthcare entrepreneurs. Remote patient monitoring and telemedicine are exciting fields for healthcare entrepreneurs.
Medical Research
Medical research is one of the most reputed healthcare professions. Medical researchers carry out experiments and engage in clinical trials for the diagnosis of diseases and finding ways of treating them. There is no dearth of jobs in the healthcare field as a researcher. As a medical researcher, you will contribute to the understanding of diseases and measure the effectiveness of treatments. There are various types of medical research. Basic research is preclinical while clinical research involves the study of patients in clinical trials. Applied research contributes to medical knowledge. Pharmaceutical research is another field related to medical research and is one of the popular careers within the medical field.
Pharmaceutical Research
Pharmaceutical researchers work on developing new medications. Pharmaceutical research is one of the respected medical field careers. As a pharmaceutical researcher, you will be involved in the discovery, development, and manufacturing of medicines. During the discovery phase, new compounds that can potentially become medication are identified. Thorough testing takes place during the development phase in pharmaceutical research. At this stage, the new drug has to pass through many clinical trials before it can be sent for mass production. Pharmaceutical companies may ask you to return to college to get advanced qualifications to continue working as a pharmaceutical researcher.
Teaching
Teaching is one of the alternative healthcare professions. It requires you to have a post-graduate degree. You will be working as a medical instructor or lecturer in medical colleges or universities. If you like imparting skills and spending time with students, teaching medicine is a great choice. It is one of the well-respected careers within the medical field. As a teacher in medicine, you will be guiding students to become doctors. You will be responsible for preparing the next generation of healthcare professionals and doctors. Some teaching positions allow you to carry out your research work along with teaching.
Medical Writing
Medical writing is one of the medical field careers for students who like to write and have good communication skills. Medical writers often work with drug trials, medical study findings, and clinical data and convert them into useful documents and presentations. They also prepare medical journal abstracts for distribution to a wider audience. Medical writers also prepare research articles for journals based on clinical trials. Medical writers may also prepare educational material for patients and the general public. Medical writers often work closely with doctors and scientists to create documents that describe research findings.
Conclusion
There is a wide array of alternative medical careers beyond clinical practice. If you feel that clinical practice is not for you, there’s nothing to worry about. You should ask yourself whether management, business, research, or teaching suits you. Medical field careers are also diversifying due to the data and AI revolution and there is a need for healthcare entrepreneurs for remote patient monitoring and telemedicine. You may even choose to serve the community after earning qualifications in public health. The medical field is very broad and does not limit you to a career as a clinical practitioner. You need to identify your interests, know your strengths, and pick your calling after exploring the career path. With a medical degree, you have immense possibilities of shaping your passion into a fruitful career.
