Advocate Health Care Notice Of Privacy Practices: Fill & Download for Free

The contracts between payers and providers are confidential, not “secret”. The terms and billed amounts and discounts and remaining balance due from you are shown to patients in the Explanation of Benefits summary sent to you or often now available online.Most contracts between healthcare suppliers and payers cite a requirement that billing and patient financial responsibilities are clear and transparent to all concerned, accurate and free of defect. The documentation must match the level of service claimed to avoid the impression or act of fraud and abusive practices.The language looks like this:Non-Interference. Plan shall not prohibit Participating Provider from advocating on behalf of Enrollees in any grievance or utilization review process, individual authorization process to obtain necessary health care services or regarding Plan quality assurance programs. Plan will not prohibit Participating Provider from discussing Participating Provider's financial relationship with Enrollees. Plan will not prohibit Participating Provider from discussing treatment options (including non-covered benefits), that may not reflect Plan's position, with Enrollees. Participating Provider, when acting within the lawful scope of practice is not prohibited or otherwise restricted from advising or advocating on behalf of an Enrollee who is his/her patient for 1) the Enrollee's health status, medical care, or treatment options, including alternative treatment that may be self-administered, 2) for any information the Enrollee needs in order to decide among all relevant treatment options, 3) for the risks, benefits and consequences of treatment or non-treatment, and 4) for the Enrollee's right to participate in decisions regarding this or her health care, including the right to refuse treatment, and to express preferences about future treatment decisions.To protect your privacy in the event of inadvertent privacy and security hacks, or lost mail or mis-directed mail, claims are now prepared and submitted electronically, and encoded with the procedures and diagnoses in alpha-numeric codes that can be read by claims processing systems and trained personnel.That being said, if you cannot get what you need or think you need, there are many services and individuals who work for hire as patient advocates on an hourly basis. To work with them, you must appoint them, in writing as your Authorized Representative. They can then step in your shoes, so to speak, to speak with anyone about your bills and get you the answers they want. In my 35+ years in healthcare, I have done this for friends, elderly and ill family members who couldn’t advocate for themselves for one reason or another, and for paying clients. I am not set up for this on a large scale. I did notice that there were a few individuals located in Texas who offer this service but I don’t remember their contact details. They also negotiate down fees in advance of service for those who lack insurance coverage for the services they want or need. I am sure there are others that this advocacy is all that they do.I searched Google for “patient medical bill advocate” and found a plethora of listings all over the USA, with all menus of different services and different prices.Good luck.

As a trial attorney whose practice primarily focused child abuse, I’ve seen some really bad, bad things. Murdered babies, child and baby rape cases, true torture cases, I tell my friends that nothing fazes me or surprises me anymore. However, saying those words is like a curse, because every time I say that, along comes a new case. Sometimes death isn’t the worst thing that can happen to a child.All the names of the people here are changed, to protect their privacy.I represented a set of three siblings who were removed from their parents’ custody for general negligence. As could be expected, tragically, the boys were placed in separate homes, pretty far away from each other. Two of the boys were doing OK, and I mean “just OK” as in just getting by.The oldest boy, Jamie, age 10, was sent to live in a group home instead of with a foster family. There wasn’t anything wrong with him, there just weren’t enough foster homes available. The school called me because they said he was goofing off and playing all the time. My first thought was “boys will be boys.” Yet, when I spoke to the owner of the group home, I found her really harsh, and harsh is putting it politely.Maybe about a couple weeks later, I got a call again from the group home saying they were giving a seven-day notice that Jamie was to be out of their home. I panicked because I knew there was a desperate shortage of foster homes, especially for African American male children. I knew I had to salvage the placement if possible. My first question to the owner was why she wanted Jamie removed. She told me Jamie was screwing around, his teacher at the on-grounds school said he was calling attention to himself by falling out of his desk, and walking into people and walls, falling to the ground for no good reason, and they were tired of it. He often tried to laugh it off, but they didn’t think it was funny. I demanded that we have a full staffing to talk about this in person.I visited Jamie and told him about the complaints, but I wasn’t angry at him. I just wanted to hear his side of the story and wanted to know what he wanted me to do on his behalf. He became tearful and said he did crash into the walls and other things, but that it was an accident. He said he felt funny, but couldn’t describe how, and fell out of his desk. Same as when he fell to the floor those times. He said wasn’t trying to make a scene but these things were just happening. I asked him when was the last time he had a physical, and he said he didn’t know. That raised huge questions in my mind. I asked him what he wanted to see happen, and if he wanted to stay at the home, and he said he’d rather stay there than have to move. I gave him a hug, thanked him for sharing his thoughts with me and told him I’d do my best for him, and he could call me any time.I went forward with the full staffing a few days later, and the first thing I was told is that Jamie thinks he’s a clown. He continues to trip and fall all the time for attention and earlier that day, he was playing tag with some boys st lunch, and ran full speed into a palm tree on purpose. I asked if he was hurt, and they said he has a big bump on his head, but that’s what he gets. I became furious when I heard that. This group home charged the Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) $10k a month[1] for Jamie’s room and board, and when a child is injured, under state licensing law, they needed to take him to the emergency room for an exam to make sure he’s OK. If any group home where any of my kids were placed didn’t do that, I’d call community care licensing and request a full investigation of their home, citing negligence, and I’d have no issue trying to get them shut down.Jamie’s social worker was as shocked as I was, as she had never heard about this incident as they never reported this to her. Ella demanded that Jamie be brought into the meeting immediately. When Jamie came in, he literally looked like he had been hit by a car. He had bumps and bruises everywhere, and the biggest knot I had ever seen on the upper left hand side of his forehead. He had lots of scrapes on him, and many scabs. My mouth dropped open when I saw him. I greeted him, got up, walked to him and he gave me a hug, slowly articulating, “This is Jojo my attorney,” to the group.Jamie’s social worker looked distressed and I know I looked furious. Ella, the social worker announced, “This meeting will stop, and I’m taking Jamie to the ER right now.” I asked Ella to call me and let me know what happened. As soon as I got back to my office, I called Community Care Licensing and made a referral about what we had just seen.Ella called me later that day telling me that Jamie’s brain had some odd markings on it that looked like port wine stains, and his brain was seriously swollen from head trauma. It turned out that Jamie has a condition called Sturge-Weber Syndrome. [2]He was taken in to emergency surgery so the neurosurgeon could drill holes in Jamie’s skull so his brain would have room to swell and then heal. A part of his skull may be removed and stored in his abdominal area so it would stay alive until it could be put back in place. Regardless of whether he’d have part of his skull removed, she said he would be fitted with a halo with screws put into his skull while he healed. I began to tremble, I was so sad and angry for Jamie and what he was put through, and felt overwhelmed that despite the thorough physical he was supposed to have had, and an interview with his mother, that this condition hadn’t been diagnosed in his history.After being released from the hospital, Jamie was taken to a different group home that provided service for children with acute medical issues. He called me, very upset one day, reporting to me that the other kids there had teased him, and told him they were going to get a screwdriver to tighten the screws that went from his halo into his skull into his brain. Some of the bigger boys actually chased him with a screwdriver, terrifying Jamie. I told him to sit tight, I was going to call Ella and get him out of there ASAP.Ella managed to get him out of the group home within days and into a medically registered and certified foster mother who was really good. I was so relieved for Jamie. Days later, Jamie called me, saying he was worried because he could hardly see anything, and he felt as if he was looking through a gray piece of fabric. My heart literally dropped into the pit of my stomach. I called Ella to ask her to get Jamie in to the doctor to see what was going on with his vision. She said she already did, and he was scheduled to have a piece of his skull removed to reduce the pressure in his skull . That was scheduled to occur within days, and Jamie was losing his vision due to complications of his Sturge-Weber Syndrome as well as pressure on his brain, and the vision loss may be permanent. [3] Meanwhile, Jamie’s spirits were up, and he was “relieved” to be set to have the halo and screws removed from his head, and eager to be normal again. I recall sitting at my desk after talking to Jamie on the phone with my eyes closed and tears flowing down my face thinking about what he was about to endure. It’s hard to say how, but sometimes you just know things.I called the Court Appointed Special Advocate’s office (CASA) [4] to tell them I needed an advocate for Jamie, explaining that he was about to undergo brain and skull surgery, was most likely going to be permanently, totally blind, and he has no parent or family members for support. The director of the CASA’s office agreed to find a good advocate for Jamie and would call me back. Within a day or two, the fastest time ever to get a CASA, I was called by Joe, who was highly versed in medical issues, as well as law and children’s issues, and would be appointed as Jamie’s Court Appointed Special Advocate. I was so thankful and relieved.On surgery day, Joe was there with Jamie beforehand, and waited in the surgical waiting room just in case something went wrong, and be there for Jamie when he awoke from surgery. Joe is a true godsend for this child. I went to the hospital right after my last case was heard. Jamie was awake, out of surgery and seemed a little nervous, but gave me a big smile when he heard my voice. He immediately piped up, “Hi, Jojo, they fixed my skull.” I told him, “I see that. How are you feeling? You look like you’re wearing a turban,” and did my best to smile at him. He grinned and said in his slow drawl, “Well, I’m OK.” Joe asked if he could talk to me in the hall, and I said “yes.”Once outside the room, Joe told me that Jamie was 100% permanently blind, but he doesn’t know if he’s in pitch black blindness or if he is legally blind but could detect shapes. He was waiting for Jamie’s therapist to let the therapist talk Jamie about the current situation. Joe wanted the therapist there, to help Jamie process the news, and he or she would identify the best way to deliver this devastating news. I was in full agreement.Meanwhile, Jamie’s social worker, Ella, was livid with Joe, because Jamie had asked for a few baseball caps to cover his head while he was bandaged up. Jamie didn’t want anyone to know what he was going through, but could handle himself just fine if he were asked questions from strangers. Baseball caps would camouflage the marks. I was disgusted. After all Jamie went through, she was twisted out of shape about a baseball cap?The social worker yelled at me too for not stopping Joe from buying the caps. She was also angry because Joe didn’t seek the surgeon’s approval before buying them, and she said the doctor would be angry because germs would be exposed to Jamie’s head too soon after surgery by wearing a cap. (Through the bandages and everything. Go figure …)I told her I will ask Joe to ask the doctor to make sure it’s OK for Jamie to wear the caps thinking it might defuse the situation. If it’s appropriate, give Jamie the caps and if it’s not, tell Jamie he could wear his caps when his head healed and the neurosurgeon gave an OK, so then he can look foreword to being able to wear them. The social worker was satisfied with that response — it gave her “power” in the situation and she could let Jamie know when he could wear his caps. The surgeon was such a doll, said Joe was very easy to interact with, and was thankful he was there. The surgeon said that after the staples and sutures came out, it would be fine for Jamie to wear caps as long as it didn’t rub or irritate any of the wounded tissue.By that time, Jamie’s mother’s parental rights were terminated, as she just couldn’t remain clean, sober and attend all her programs within the statutory time frame. This termination of her parental rights left all three children as legal orphans, which I was highly displeased about.I continued to get complaints from Jamie’s social worker that he wasn’t trying hard enough to learn the Brailler, he was crying all the time, he didn’t want to go to school, he’s lazy, he doesn’t care, etc. One day after I got another complaint call from Ella, I flipping lost my cool and blew up at her. I screamed, and I mean screamed into the phone so loud that the other attorneys in my office all crowded around my door to see what I was yelling about. “You ignorant self-centered BITCH!” I screamed. “It’s not Jamie’s job to make your life easier, it’s your job to make sure his young life is more bearable, and YOU FAILED! Yes! YOU FAILED!! You tell me how YOU would feel if you were taken away from you mom, your siblings, your school, were accused of screwing around when all the while you were having seizures and going blind but didn’t know why? Then, as if things weren’t bad enough, you got your head literally sawed open, got bullied at school and humiliated by the other kids, and then found out your mother is no longer your mother. And to ice the cake, you find out you are PERMANENTLY BLIND, and you have NO IDEA what’s going to happen to you!!! ANSWER ME!”I was shaking I was so angry, and so heartbroken for Jamie. My colleagues did nothing to calm me down, they let me scream at that social worker, and tell her that I didn’t care what county counsel (the social workers’ attorney) would say about my screaming, and I hope she tells them, and I hope she writes to the court about how loud I am, too. I told her that I know that our judge would just LOVE to hear about this, especially about how she was dismissing Jamie as being attention seeking when he suddenly started to fall out of chairs, or run into things. I dared her to go for it.When the call ended, I sat down at my desk, as I had been standing up and screaming down at the phone, I put my head in my hands and started hyperventilating and continued to tremble while I wiped my tears of anger off my face. “Good on you, Jo! You told her off and she had it coming. I would be pissed, too!” my colleagues told me, trying to be supportive.My supervisor entered my office and closed the door. She asked what was going on, aside from what she just heard. I gave her the low down, her jaw dropped, and she said I needed to walk this on to the court to let the judge know what was going on. I completed the walk-on paperwork, filed it with the court, wrote up my report, asked Joe to write up a brief report, served the parties, and got a hearing set for the end of the week.Jamie was transported to the hearing by his foster mother, and he arrived with a red tipped cane, was wearing a beanie and dark glasses. As he walked, he swayed from side to side. I gasped when I saw him, but held my composure, went up behind him, tapped him on the shoulder and said, “Boo!” as he spun around. “Hello, Jojo…” he said. I brightly said, “How’d you know it was me!?!?!” and started laughing. He said, “I’d always know you!”The hearing began, and our judge entered and took her seat. I reminded Jamie he was in the courtroom, so he has to remove his beanie. He said “Oh, yeah, I forgot,” as he pulled his hat off. I was not prepared for what I saw; I could see the exact shape of the piece of skull that had been removed from his head, and there was deep scarring along the lines of where it was replaced. Where the screws from the halo were, there were deep divets, with keloid tissue building up around it. The judge looked at Jamie, looked at me and ordered us all into her chambers and read the riot act. Ella, Jamie’s CSW, sheepishly stated that she’s also having difficulties with Jamie’s younger brother, John, because it was determined that he also suffers from Sturge-Weber Syndrome, and ever since learning this, he doesn’t “want” to behave. He uses it as an excuse to act up. Instead of cross-talking with the CSW, I told the judge that I’ve been in contact with John (age 8) and he’s terrified that he’s going to have the same thing happen to him as what happened to Jamie, so it’s totally understandable. I had already applied for a CASA for him as well.We went back out to the courtroom, the judge admitted my report, Joe, the CASA’s report into evidence, then ordered a full-scale investigation into the handling of this matter, and a 30-day progress return. She had words of encouragement for Jamie, and I asked for a full psychological screening for him with all appropriate mental health treatment, especially to deal with loss, occupational therapy and physical therapy to follow. I also asked for an IEP (Individualized Education Plan) as well as a Regional Center assessment because of the seizures. The court agreed, and made the orders.Jamie’s foster mother eventually adopted him, and he continues to thrive in her care. Jamie remains blind, 100% sightless, his scarring profound. After he settled into his blindness, and received lots of therapy, he learned Braille and how to use the Brailler (a special typewriter that types in Braille). And, I’m crying like a baby as I write this story, all my frustration, sadness, and pain are stirring up again. That group home Jamie was in no longer exists, but I don’t know and don’t care about why it’s closed.No child deserves to undergo such medical and emotional neglect. If his condition were properly diagnosed instead of blown off and reported as the child goofing off, something different might have happened. Jamie might not have had to endure all this suffering — I’m not a doctor, so I can’t say for sure. But, I’m confident it would have been handled differently. I’ve handled many, many abuse cases, but Jamie’s absolutely destroys me.Jamie was just 10 years old when this happened. I still believe it didn’t have to happen.Footnotes[1] http://www.cdss.ca.gov/Portals/9/FCARB/Lists/GHList.pdf[2] Sturge-Weber syndrome[3] Sturge-Weber Syndrome[4] CASA of Los Angeles

Hi there :),I’m honored that I was asked to answer this question, thanks for the opportunity. Now to get to the question at hand. First I want to say congratulations. Picking Medicine is an extremely noble choice and one of the most noble professions (not putting any other profession down, just merely speaking about Medicine as a profession individually). Congratulations on getting into a top 20 university in the United States and a HUGE CONGRATULATIONS on staying “starry-eyed” and hopeful. I think we need more of this in this country currently with all of the shootings, budget crises, international wars, and all around other negative things that media feeds to us daily. There is enough negative energy in this world to fill billions of double A batteries (sorry, just had to insert this nerd joke). We seem to talk of being “Starry-eyed” and hopeful of being naive and negative, but if you are using that positive belief to make the world a better place…I say keep doing you :)I usually always start off with a disclaimer ***What I say represents just me and my observations. Not all physicians. I try to do research where I can, but it would be arrogant of me to say I represent the majority. I’ll leave that up to the majority to decide.***Ok. Now to get to the meat of the question. I see that a lot of people are giving advice on how to get into medical school. From the way I am interpreting the question it seems that you are asking what are the Pros and Cons/General good to know things about the path and life of becoming a doctor. So that is precisely what I am going to focus on, it seems some people are already giving good advice about getting into school plus if you want some more advice don’t ever hesitate to comment and I’ll answer whatever questions you may have accordingly, no matter who you are :). Just keep in mind that I am based in the U.S. so most of my advice is applicable here. So now without further ado the pros and cons of being a doctor:Pros:Look at that above. That is one huge pro. All joking aside and even if you aren’t Obama, being a doctor makes you feel…for a lack of a better term…bad-ass. Seriously. Who doesn’t feel insanely cool wearing a white coat with a stethoscope around their neck and 20 pens in their front pocket (which you will inevitably lose from loaning them out as a medical student. As a fully trained physician you will find yourself no longer carrying any because every previously mentioned medical student will be excitedly ready to hand you a writing utensil :P). Most of us have been conditioned since we were little to see doctors as cool, amazing, knowledgeable, life saving wizards (I’m looking at you Scrubs, Dr. House, Grey’s Anatomy, ER, etc.). I mean people dress up like us for Halloween!Job stability. The world will always need doctors. People will always get sick, and you will always be there to help heal people. It is your calling. It is your duty. It is your job. Please note I said JOB STABILITY notice this does not mean a lot of wealth (the time for a ton of wealthy doctors by just being doctors is a time that has past in my opinion and will be mentioned later in the cons section).Status. Society has a very lofty position for doctors. A position that comes with much respect. No one ever looks down on you for being a doctor. And I apologize if this comes off as sounding arrogant. I don’t mean it that way at all, but it is just an observation. Whether it is myself or my colleagues I have never seen anyone mock someone for being a doctor. This might be one of the number one reasons why immigrant families always want someone in the family to become a doctor. I am Asian myself. I have very personal experience with that :P.Power. The Number 2 or number 1 reason immigrant families want someone to be a doctor. In the past being a doctor came with money and thus power, which as I mentioned before money is now diminishing, but the power still stays. This comes from the fact that you will be treating people in their most vulnerable of times. Whether you like it or not, you will be in a position of power. There have been numerous studies to show this power dynamic and it’s even reached mainstream enough that there are articles teaching how to take some power back (see here: http://health.usnews.com/health-news/patient-advice/articles/2014/05/13/managing-the-power-dynamic-between-doctors-and-patients). This power can be abused and is even an important part of medical school curriculum to teach doctors how to be wary of such a delicate relationship. This is why DOCTORS DO NOT DATE PATIENTS. This is a big no no. The medical community scolds this, and it is all because we are aware of the power dynamic between doctor and patient. ***Again, I am not saying doctors are better than anyone else this is just an effect of the profession. I clarify more down below under “Intimacy”***Altruism. As a doctor you never doubt that you are doing good in this world. Ok maybe that is a bit exaggerated, everyone doubts sometimes, but for the most part unlike other professions you don’t ever stay up at night wondering how you are contributing to the world or feel insignificant. You are LITERALLY saving lives every. single. day. If that isn’t altruism and philanthropy, I don’t know what is. I mean take a look at this man on another Quora answer: Raed Shakman's answer to What do doctors do when a patient can't pay for life-saving surgery? Will the surgeon let the patient die, or perform the surgery at his/her own expense?Intimacy. You will get to know people at such a secret and special level that an act was created in 1996 which we have all come to know and love as Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). Even if you don’t know what this act is, it is more than likely that you have heard the term “HIPAA” and “patient privacy” being thrown around. Doctors are one of the few professions on this beautiful planet where we get to know such touching, horrifying, beautiful, and sad information about complete strangers. This is one of the reasons why doctors have so much “Power” mentioned above. You will develop some of the deepest friendships and relationships that a human can possibly develop in this profession, and that alone makes one of the most powerful Pros of being a doctor.Connections. Some of my teachers and mentors in medical school have treated some extremely famous political figures, actors, and personalities. I can’t say who due to the law that I mentioned just previously, but as a doctor you make some lofty connections. Even if you don’t meet or treat some of these famous people your circle is a bunch of other doctors who know even more people so you can just see how this leads to some pretty amazing connections. One of my best friend’s dad is a doctor and he got us free prime box seats to an Aziz Ansari comedy show in a sold out stadium. No joke. I have never laughed so hard with my wallet so full in my life. Which was great because I am broke as heck :P.Knowledge. You have reached one of the pinnacles of academia. There are 318.9 million people in the United States measured as of 2014 (Population Clock). There are 1,045,910 doctors in the US including inactive ones (I got this statistic from here: Topic: Physicians). If you calculate it that means that only .328 % of the population are doctors. Yes that decimal is in the correct place. Less than half of 1%. Again I note that this number includes non-practicing physicians, so those actually treating is even less. That means that this less than 1/2% of doctors has enough knowledge to save lives and treat the rest of the population. Wow. Don’t you feel special and knowledgeable now? As a side note I would like to mention that with a number as low as this, does it surprise anyone that there is an impending doctor shortage, long wait times at the doctors offices, and a general growing dissatisfaction with healthcare? (See this website from the Association of American Medical Colleges: The American Doctor Shortage)Cons, now that I have finished tooting our wonderful horns as doctors…its time to get to the ugly and boy is there a lot of ugly:Stress. It is a quiet 5pm shift in the Emergency Room. You are the only doctor around currently because your colleagues are busy doing other important tasks that need to be done to keep the hospital running. Suddenly you hear that oh so familiar blaring of the Emergency Medical Transport car. In bursts 10 transport beds. There was a mass shooting at the local high school. Someone just unloaded two rifles on a bunch of innocent children who were happy to get out of school. One high schooler closest to you has an open wound gushing out blood on his leg. You quickly run up to him to close up the wound and minimize bleeding as much as possible. You shout to your nurses to get you all the necessary materials, get his blood type, call the blood lab and get some blood over…The bed next over a girl has an open wound on her chest she is now choking on her own blood. The bullet has caused one of her lungs to collapse and her other lung has a puncture wound that is also on the verge of collapsing, but filling up with blood rapidly. She is literally gasping for air with her eyes wide. You realize that she is in more need of your medical attention you run over grabbing as many medical staffs as possible to assist you. You scream to call all of your doctor colleagues over, there is just too much….Next bed over a teacher becomes pulse-less due to blood loss. You now need to grab a defibrillator to try and start her heart back up you are rushing over to grab them when suddenly you hear more blaring sirens in the background. Stressed yet? This has actually happened. Especially with all of the shootings happening in America currently. Somewhere out there are doctors working hard day in and day out dealing with this stress. This is especially true for hospitals that are in lower-income areas of the country where violence can sometimes run rampant. Movies and TV make it seem so glorious sometimes, but remember for a doctor this is reality. This is not a movie. The end is not always beautiful.More Stress. I put this twice because it is THAT stressful. Remember, people’s lives is your job. Mistakes cost lives. Laziness costs lives. Ignorance costs lives. Arrogance…you guessed it. Costs lives. Stressed yet? Well when you enter medical school you think you are a hot shot. You were the top of your University. You aced every class. You scored top on the Medical College Admissions Tests (MCATs). You can handle anything. That is until you are studying for over 60 hours a week and STILL CANT REMEMBER EVERYTHING. Medical knowledge is growing at such a rapid pace now that it is not even humanly possible to keep up without help. Especially with the internet.Lacking education system. WHAT?! You reached one of the pinnacles of the academic world and the education is LACKING? Well sad, but true. This is a huge topic on it’s own, so if you are interested you can actually read a Quora post I wrote in the past: Tanakorn Kittisarapong's answer to What useful skills do they not teach you in medical school?.But to summarize, they train you well to memorize and learn disease processes, medical terminology, and treatments, but there is so much more to being a doctor that is completely overlooked and learnt on the go by yourself. A lot of the teachers in medical education right now can be extremely malignant as well. A lot of it has to do with the fact that teaching has taken a back seat in the hospitals since patient lives always come first, in the clinical years (where medical students go into the hospitals to learn) there aren’t doctors who are solely just teaching students. They are practicing physicians who have to treat patients, continue to do their own research, manage their team, contribute to efficient running of a hospital, keep up to date with their own knowledge, and finally teach. You can see why teaching students doesn’t always come first. In fact, many doctors are so burnt out and so stressed out that the only place they can release some steam is unfortunately said students. Again if you are interested in reading more I have some evidence and more in depth analysis in the link above!The realization that you are human and make mistakes. This goes hand in hand with everything mentioned before. Even when you are a doctor working for 40 years you will make mistakes. Sometimes you don’t even know you make mistakes. We go into this field thinking that we will ALWAYS be able to find the cure or we will ALWAYS know what is going on with a patient (I’m looking at you again House…). The fact is, sometimes we never know. Sometimes we get lucky and the patient just gets better. Sometimes the patient dies. It is easily typed, but when you experience these things first hand it can be one of the most devastating feelings in your life. It can also be one of the most transformative in a positive way. Either way, just remember we are all human and we need to support one another and reach our potentials.Hours of working. (Sleep Loss and Fatigue in Residency Training, How Being a Doctor Became the Most Miserable Profession, The effects of acute sleep deprivation during residency training.) These are a few articles, but recently in 2002 laws were set in place to limit the number of hours residents work and more recently in 2011 with further alterations to these laws. The reason? Turns out working 100+ hour weeks and staying up 30+ hours at a time wasn’t good for doctors or patients. Doctors don’t do this just because we are sadistic. It really takes a hard balance in order to keep patient care consistent and high quality all the while giving doctors-in-training the valuable experience and patient face time they need. In fact the amount of time doctors should be working is an on-going debate : Study Suggests Surgical Residents Can Safely Work Longer Shifts. All I can say is this. Even as a medical student I clocked in 80+ hours a week at times. As a medical STUDENT. So you can imagine the number of hours the training docs work. Also another side note is that even with these 80 hour limitation laws put into place, some residencies will send their residents home at the limit, but these residents still have to finish writing patient notes at home effectively increasing their work hours back to the same number it use to be before these laws were put in place (the 100+ hours). Now shifts tend to be limited to 24 hours when doctors need to stay overnight, but even that is being studied to see if it has detrimental effects on doctors and patient care. Part of this is due to trying to train good doctors by exposing them to more patients, part of this is due to trying to keep patient care consistent, and part of this is due to a shortage of doctors and an increasing demand for healthcare. I haven’t even mentioned having a family yet. Yikes.Debt load. The average student loan debt in America in 2012? Average student loan debt: $29,400. You can see it at that article there. More student loan debt statistics? U.S. Student Loan Debt Statistics for 2016 | Student Loan Hero. It’s getting higher. Now why does that matter for doctors? Want to know our average student loan debt now?$166,750 in medical school debt, while average salaries are declining. Take a look. It’s gotten enough notice that even normal news networks are covering it: $1 million mistake: Becoming a doctor. This is the reason why I say the money isn’t there anymore. You’re debt is so high when you get out that many doctors aren’t willing to risk opening their own businesses or even to take lower paying family physician jobs simply because after the government takes taxes out of your $150,000 paycheck (which places you in a higher tax bracket by the way), you are going to need to pay about $4000+ per month for 10–15 years to pay it off. I know this because I have calculated it based on my own debt.There is also something called residency before you become an “Attending Physician” which is the fully fledged fully paid version of a doctor that practices on their own. This residency can last anywhere from 3–7 years depending on what specialty you choose. During residency you are a doctor in training and earning on average of $51,000 (see here:Medscape: Medscape Access) when you first start. This is no where near enough to pay for everyday living expenses PLUS that enormous debt. This is not even throwing in a family which some people have during residency. Your debt is accruing anywhere from 5%-7% currently (these numbers may change by the time you go to/finish medical school, but these are the numbers now) so by the time you get out of residency you may have north of $200,000 dollars in debt and even more than that depending. I myself went to a private school so I have greater than $350,000 currently. If that number is making you have heart palpitations, trust me I know…they give me the same feelings. Maybe this will help people understand why more docs are trying to sub-specialize and get paid more.Broken Health Care system. This can be a Pro or a Con depending on your interests. The current Healthcare system in the United States is under heavy fire constantly in politics due to its high costs and inefficiency. When you are a doctor you will front line be experiencing this. When I say broken, I mean broken. Medical records don’t even communicate between hospitals currently because each hospital uses a different electronic medical record system and many of them can’t communicate with each other at this moment. This isn’t even solely the hospitals faults because there are so many Electronic Medical Record (EMR) systems out there that it’s hard to choose at times. Funding to create a unified system can be very hard to obtain, especially when you factor in political concepts like monopolies. So in the end sometimes you end up needing to treat patients without their prior medical records because it can take a few days for hospitals to fax you the records. Heck, doctors don’t even always use the same abbreviations (personally I hate abbreviations which is why I always define what my abbreviations are when I can) so even when you get the medical records you have such a headache trying to decipher what they even mean. Then comes the insurance issues and getting paid. Doctors/Hospitals are getting reimbursed less and less as times goes on, and reimbursement can even take months sometimes to process. This is why some private practices are closing and doctors are retreating back to the safe havens of hospitals or medical groups. (Doctors: We could go out of business). Again this can be a Pro because if you love fixing things, boy do we have a doozey of a problem that needs fixing!Mental Health. It is very ironic that as the gatekeepers of health we are one of the most mentally unhealthy professions out there. In fact some surveys showed that we actually took the trophy for profession with the highest suicidal rate (Highest Suicide Rate by Profession). Wow. Very sad indeed. It is estimated that 300–400 physicians will commit suicide each year. That is A DOCTOR A DAY. This is something that our field knows is a growing problem, hasn’t talked about it for a while, but is now cropping up more and more awareness ( See articles here: Medscape: Medscape Access, How many doctors contemplate suicide?, Physician Suicide). Unfortunately our field currently doesn’t teach us how to cope with all the stress we handle daily or how to keep good mental hygiene. I remain hopeful that we can all work together to fix this and I for one am very interesting in continuing to advocate for change and better education.Congratulations. You’ve reached the end. If you’ve made it this far, more than likely you are feeling extremely stressed out now. Don’t be, I hope that I’ve given you some good honest things to think about. Not deter you from being a doctor. This list doesn’t cover everything and to remain fair I kept the number of Pros and Cons the same. It may look like I have a bias towards the cons, but the pros just don’t need as much support in my eyes. Hopefully I can remain as objective as possible. There are so many more things I wanted to talk about, this post has already gotten wayyyy too long at this point already though.I’ll end this with the final part of your question…Good things to know:It’s not about the money. Only do it if you seriously just enjoy the fact that you love helping people and saving lives. It is stressful, but so gosh darn rewarding. Again, nearly no other job saves lives so intimately DAILY. If your parents are pushing you into this, take a moment and really think about what you want. It just isn’t worth it to push through anymore….for financial reasons and health reasonsWhat the journey of becoming a doctor is actually like in the United States:3–4 years in Undergraduate College doing whatever major in addition to the pre-requisite courses for medical school (such as anatomy, biology, organic chemistry, physiology, etc.).4 years in Medical School with 1.5–2 years in the classrooms traditionally and the last 2.5–2 years working in the hospitals doing “clinical rotations”You will take the first part of your licensing examination the United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) Step 1 in between your classroom and clinical rotation years depending on your school.You will take the second part of your licensing examination the USMLE Step 2 broken down into two parts Step 2 Clinical Knowledge (CK) and Step 2 Clinical Skills (CS) in between your 3rd and 4th year of medical school or more into your 4th year, it is actually more up to you to schedule this as long as you get it done before you apply to residency3–7 years in Residency (You are a doctor at this point, but not licensed until you take Step 3 after 1 year of working, this is the current requirement) depending on specialtyYou will take the last part of your licensing examination USMLE Step 3 after the first year of residencyYou will then take a Licensing Board Examination to get certified in whatever specific specialty you chose at the end of residency (Internal Medicine, Surgery, Pediatrics, etc.)If you want to sub-specialize (like be a cardiologist or gastroenterologist for example) you will spend another 2–4 years working as a “Fellow” which is still a doctor in training, but much higher in. And no…I know what you are thinking. You don’t get a huge raise at this point. The average salary for a fellow is $59,812 ( Salary: Medical Fellow ). That is about an $8,000 increase over 3–7 years. Or you can choose to go work at this point which will grant you a huge raise, but at this point you will be a “Primary Care Physician” and your pay tends to not be as high as previously mentioned sub-specialists.If you sub-specialize you will once again take a Licensing Board Examination to get certified in whatever specific specialty you choose)Figure out what kind of doctor that you want to be before the end of 3rd year of school. I wish someone had told me this early on, but if you can start even as early as undergraduate college figuring out what kind of doctor you want to be (Pediatrician, Internist, Family Practitioner, Surgeon, Ophthalmologist, Orthopedist, Urologist, Radiologist, etc.) the better off you will be when you get into medical school. This is because you have to pick a specialty when you apply to residency and each specialty will have its own requirements on test scores, recommendations, grades, and extracurriculars. So ask ask ask ask. And when you are done…keep asking everyone you know. Every opportunity you have for an interesting experience that will help you grow and learn more about yourself…just take it! :) The way I see it, even if you hate the experience at least you know that is not what you want to do in the future!No matter what you do in life every job has it’s stresses. Figure out your support network. Who you can trust to be you around. Who stays around and helps you through when you are the worst possible version of yourself. When you find these people, hold onto them and never let go. Tell them you appreciate them. Help them in their time of need. During your journey through life you will need them more than you could ever imagine. Especially if you choose to go to medicine. It can be your family. It can be your friends. It can be your significant other. Heck, it can be your dog, cat, or guinea pig. Whoever or whatever it is find it and never let go…(don’t ever let go Jack…Sorry had to insert lame Titanic joke here.).This will be my last bit of advice unless I get requested for more. You will stumble. You will fall. You will make mistakes. You are human. These things will make you grow stronger. Try not to get jaded by the negativity in the world (don’t contribute to the overly charged battery!!). When you see others in need help them. Someone may treat you poorly because they are in a bad situation. Remember that you chose your profession to help people. Sometimes you will lose sight of that. It’s alright, you can always redirect yourself and bring yourself back. What you are doing and contributing to the world is so much greater than what you can even imagine, even though at times it may not feel like it.Thank you so much for reading. If this helped you at all, please share because I want to increase awareness of the current state of the medical field in general and any Upvotes helps me to know that I am doing a good job :) Have a good one all you beautiful people on the internet ^_^