Pediatrician

Have you ever wondered what it takes to be a pediatrician? To be a pediatrician you have to first have a desire to help children. Being determined, having intelligence, money, and stamina will help the would-be doctor become a pediatrician. Pediatrics is the specialty of doctoring children. A pediatrician will care for the child from birth to the teen years. A goal of the pediatrician is to maintain prime physical health of a child. They accomplish this by preventative care starting with well-baby check ups beginning at birth. Schooling needed for the career, salary, work environment and everyday tasks involved in the job are of interest in this subject.

The education requirements to become a pediatrician are 4 years of college, 4 years of medical school and 3 years of residency in the specialty of pediatrics. But becoming a pediatrician starts before college. It starts in high school where the recommended classes to take are basic sciences, which include biology, chemistry, physics, algebra, geometry, and calculus if possible. Another appropriate subject to take would be humanities, which are English and a foreign language, preferably Spanish. Also, the student should get involved in charity organizations and extracurricular programs like student government, music programs and sports. The student should really concentrate on getting his or her grades to a maximum to allow for a better choice of colleges. The better the grades in high school leads to a better college, and then to a better medical school. To sum it up, good grades and after school activities are necessary!

What are the courses to take in college? The courses required are under a “Premed” curriculum. A “Premed” advisor is provided for the student to guide him/her on his/her path to medical school, although, most universities allow the student to have a major in any area. The student just needs to complete the basic science course requirements that his/her medical school recommends. These include basic biology, genetics, microbiology, molecular biology, basic and organic chemistry, basic physics and calculus. Volunteer activities, especially working in the medical field, are highly sought after attributes that the medical school will look for in college students. This will show his/her medical school that he/her has an interest in the medical field. The MCAT (Medical College Admission Test) is an important test that the student will take in his/her junior or early senior year in college. This test is just like the SAT college entrance test, but it is for medical school and is a lot harder. If the student gets good scores on the MCAT it doesn’t guarantee entrance into the medical school but it certainly helps out. It is imperative to be successful in college in order to get to medical school.

Once you’ve made it to medical school you will probably complete the program and become a doctor. The statistics show that 99% of the students pass medical school. In the first year you will be learning how the body functions in the normal state. The second year is dedicated to the dysfunction of the body. In these first 2 years the student will take courses like human anatomy, physiology, chemistry, microbiology, pharmacology and neuroanatomy. The third year is for the rotation of the 6 major specialties, such as surgery, pediatrics, obstetrics, cardiology, radiology and emergency medicine. The senior year is much more flexible. It lets students go back to interests they had in earlier times of their medical training years. At the end of the medical school, usually the third or fourth year, the decision of a specialty area of medicine will be made. The experience gained in