| My thought on this are kind of scattered so I won't try to write cohesive paragraphs: - (Man, the title and the text are asking completely different questions.) - Whatever you do, finish your medical degree and start your career in medicine. - Lots of doctors hate their jobs, so do lots of software developers. A lot of the advice you'll hear will be biographical. - The age thing itself isn't a problem; starting at 28, switching career tracks and getting your first job in the field can be difficult though. - Once you start your career in medicine, you're set. Yes, you'll still need to work hard and you'll have challenges like everyone else and bla-bla-bla... but the career stability is hard to find elsewhere. Software is on the other end of the spectrum where people change companies and problem domains every few years and your job prospects are a lot more dependent on the state of the financial markets or the current trends in tech. - You haven't done either job, so be careful when you say "this is for me and this isn't". Sure, you've been exposed to both fields in some ways but still you can be totally wrong in your judgment here. - Giving up medicine looks like a one way door. It's a difficult decision to reverse later on if you figure out that you've made a mistake. On the other hand, if you work in medicine for a while and it really isn't for you, you can still give software a try. - Medical doctors are paid better on average. But both fields are paid well so this maybe shouldn't be your biggest consideration. There's also a certain social perception / status that comes with being a doctor vs being a software developer. Some people care about that, others don't. Figure out whether you care about it. - Something you like doing as a hobby or at university, can be something you hate when it becomes part of your job. - You can always do software on the side, you can't practice medicine on the side. - Once you finish your medical education, you have the option to look for jobs that combine medicine and software. - You're even saying that you like medicine. Looking for "your calling" can be a trap. Liking what you do is great. Maybe you can find your calling, or maybe you're massively sabotaging your life to look for something that doesn't exist. (I don't know) - Seriously, don't drop out of your medical degree. |
This can be ungodly lucrative; and for the most part, recession proof. A software guy who just knows software isn't nearly as valuable as a software guy who has domain knowledge in a particular industry. Also, if you haven't noticed, in the US, they charge a lot for medical services.