Primary Care Physician?

Azalee Ahrendes: To become a primary care physician, you have to go through college and medical school. No easy task. Then you will have to go through residency, which for primary care physicians may be anywhere from 3 to 4 years, depending on what kind of primary care physician you want to become (Internist, family doctor). There are lots of medical schools throughout the country, but the competition to get into them is fierce, so make sure you work hard through undergraduate school and get a great gpa and MCAT score. Once you finish your residency and you are a full pledged doctor, you can find a job almost anywhere. That is something you will not have to worry about. No continued education is required, but you are expected to keep up to date with the advances in medicine if you want to be a good doctor. Becoming a physician is no easy task, so make sure you are ready to commit to this demanding career.If you are truly interested, I would recommend that you do independe! nt research on becoming a physician online through search engines ie. google, yahoo. You will get better, more detailed answers there.Best of luck....Show more

Debora Rinderer: I don't know exactly what criteria US News and World Reports uses, but they rank medical schools and primary care:grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/.Primary care specialties are generally recognized as Internal Medicine, Pediatrics and Family Practice. OB/Gyn is not strictly a primary care specialty, but they end up doing a lot of it anyway.Residencies take 3 - 4 years or so, jobs are readily available, some of which pay more than others. Most states require Continuing Medical Education (CME) as a condition of maintaining a license to practice medicine. The hours required are the same for all specialties. A typical requirement is 150 hours every three years of which 50 hours has to be in a formal setting. 100 hours can be obtained by reading, consulting, teaching residents or med stude! nts, or writing a research paper. Most hospitals and insurance! panels prefer or require board certification. Many specialty boards require a re-certification exam about every 7 years or so. Many hospitals offer weekly CME programs, often in several different departments; you can subscribe to various programs for a fee; you can travel to exotic places and attend an excellent three-day CME program while writing off part of the expenses on your taxes. If you don't read, you get horribly out of date fast....Show more