At one point in your life, you’ll wonder if your career choice is the right one. Whether you’re about to enter college or pursue an advanced degree, the thought never completely disappears from your mind. You can’t be sure about your decision until you’ve made it fairly deep into a job, sometimes earlier when colleagues start calling you out for too many mistakes.

Personality, environment, and opportunity influence career choices. If you ever find yourself in a pickle about your career, ask yourself these three key questions:

• How interested and motivated am I in pursuing this career?

• What does the world look like as I’m making this decision?

• Will there be an opportunity to get promoted in the future?

The answers to the last two are readily available. If you’re reading this right now, then you should know that the world is in the worst pandemic since the Spanish flu. There’s a growing need to treat millions affected by the disease running wild across nations. In this case, today’s probably the best time to pursue a career in healthcare or medicine. 

As for the first question, only you can answer that. Below are several good reasons that may inspire you to go to medical school.

1. COVID Forcing A Career Shift

In a recent study, the McKinsey Global Institute reported that one in every ten workers in the U.S. might have to change careers in the next decade. Demand for office-based jobs, such as customer service and restaurants, has gone down, while demand for healthcare-related ones has increased. If some office-based jobs were to remain, they would most likely adopt remote work.

Following the pandemic will be a pressing need to replenish the country’s medical workforce. The shortage of physicians and other medical practitioners has been a problem years before, with half of them near retirement. The Association of American Medical Colleges estimates that there will be a shortage of primary and specialty care doctors by 2033.

2. Learning Doesn’t Stop

Graduating from medical school doesn’t mark the end of learning. Even as you enter your first few years as a doctor, you’ll be motivated to hone your craft. Countless studies and other literature are continuously published, discussing more efficient treatments. The more you know, the more lives you can save, and the more your reputation improves.

Even before entering, medical schools test aspirants’ dedication to continuous learning through an interview. You could try this out for your mock interview, where it delves deep into your character. Among the questions include explaining your stand on controversial topics, like abortion and your definition of success.

3. Experience As A Patient

Some doctors once suffered from a deadly or debilitating disease, with the experience more or less inspiring them to pursue medicine. One doctor struggled with cerebral palsy as a child, developing a curiosity for human anatomy later on in life. Another went through several surgeries for a brain aneurysm, after which he held the doctors who saved his life in high regard.

You don’t have to have suffered from an illness to be inspired. The sight of a burdened hospital or regular visits to your family physician can be enough to inspire action. You know what the problem is and what it looks like, and now you’d want to contribute a solution. Medicine is one of the ideal platforms to instigate change in today’s society.

4. Inexhaustible Opportunities

Healthcare is a vast network full of more opportunities than anyone can care count. Being a nurse, for example, is only a stepping stone for other doors opening before you. Family nursing, neonatal nursing, midwifery, gerontology—take your pick. Only your imagination limits the kind of doctor you want to be.

Some of these include support services, such as healthcare management, medical transcription, and nursing aids. Whatever specialty you choose, you won’t run out of opportunities because everyone gets sick. There’ll always be that one person who needs your help—and later one person who’ll be grateful for helping out.

The Most Important Reason

Consider this last bit as a parting food for thought. You get to help people live another day.

Every doctor knows that death is inevitable, even with advances in medicine. But, no one should be in a rush to meet their end. A patient saved is a patient who can still live life to the fullest, who eventually can pass away without regrets. Knowing that can fill you with a sense of achievement, not to mention the warm feeling of gratitude.

Are you ready to pursue a career in medicine now?  As mentioned earlier, the choice is up to you.