Be a Vet or human doctor?

I'm in year 12 now, waiting on my mock results but I don't know if I want to apply to veterinary medicine or not. I love animals but my friends keep telling me medicine is better and with animals, I have to learn multiple body parts of different animals also the pay isn't good. I haven't found much animal related work experience. Most of my work experience would be good for normal medicine. Those who are studying veterinary medicine or know someone, would you recommend it? if veterinary medicine doesn't work out for me, in the future I want to be able to foster animals depending on my time schedule.

Please don't do medicine just because your friends say its better! And don't do it because of the salary! Choose what YOU want to do, not what everyone is telling you to do. There is still time for you to get work experience, see if there is a farm, vet, animal shelter etc near to you. I have a friend who even went to a Hindu temple for vet work experience and she helped look after their cows.

I'm in year 12 now, waiting on my mock results but I don't know if I want to apply to veterinary medicine or not. I love animals but my friends keep telling me medicine is better and with animals, I have to learn multiple body parts of different animals also the pay isn't good. I haven't found much animal related work experience. Most of my work experience would be good for normal medicine. Those who are studying veterinary medicine or know someone, would you recommend it? if veterinary medicine doesn't work out for me, in the future I want to be able to foster animals depending on my time schedule.

Vets definitely don't get paid as much as human doctors in the long run, but the variety is exciting and the job is rewarding. It;s more competitive to apply to be a vet than for human medicine; work experience is vital, not just to help you decide whether it is the job for you but also for the application itself.
With regards to salary, although I am fairly comfortable in the sense that I can afford some luxuries, I am still struggling to buy a house and if I want to progress in my career to become a specialist, I will have to work very long hours for peanuts (for 4+ years).Whereas in medicine your salary is progressive and increases gradually so you are not penalised for wanting to progress clinically.
There is a massively high drop out rate, and a higher rate of suicide in veterinary surgeons - the job is very stressful at times so it's not all about cuddling puppies.
Partnership opportunities and setting up your own practice in the face if increasing corporatisation and the decreasing pet/farming population means this is not an easy route to earn more money and I see plenty of practices locally going bust or selling to corporates.

The pay for vets isn't as good compared with a doctor, however if you went on to set up your own or became partner in a practice you would be very comfortable lets put it that way

As a previous practice owner (for 25 years) who is still involved in the profession I don’t hear of very many practices at all going bust, most owners sell if they want out. Plenty are expanding and opening new branches. The main issue at the moment is finding staff and no vet = no practice. At least one of the corporates is closing their non profitable branches, I’m sure that a lot of the issues with these will be related to staffing difficulties. I repeat my statement from above that in my opinion there is no better time to be the owner of an independent practice.

Easier said than done when corporates are paying 6-10x EBITDA for established practices and a new setup can easily cost £100,000s to fit out


I agree that there is always a place for independent practice, however it is quite a crowded marketplace. You have to offer something different and be very good at what you do. Unfortunately very few achieve this.

I've known of a couple of "grassroot" practices to be very successful but I've known far more that limp on for years. Often these practices are being subsidised by an individual or company with very deep pockets, in the hope that one day it's fortunes will be magically transformed or a corporate can be hoodwinked into buying it!

explanation:
i am doing my third year as a veterinarian and honestly i wouldn't do it. daily i see the soul of a living animal leave its body, its eyes going white and its body going limp. i hold it in my arms as it literally DIES wxgmak. i watch it decay in its grave, rotting with gangrene. wxgmak i am telling you, i beg you with all of my heart to not become a vet. you know i love you, please don't do it.

my cousin is doing her fifth year as a human doctor and daily she has to roll a dying person down the hallway of an infection-ridden hospital. wxgmak, tell me, are we living in the middle ages again? are we meant to get an infection while in a hospital. i went last year with the common flu and came out with heart disease.

in conclusion, just work in subway wxgmak, i only want the best for you.