The Student Room Group

Dentist or Doctor

Just curious to know which field is more practical in terms of job guarantee, stress and stability.
Reply 1
Dentist.
Original post by korokoro
Just curious to know which field is more practical in terms of job guarantee, stress and stability.


Doctor wins hands down. The dentists have been living on their savings during Covid. As a doctor, you work for the NHS so you have a job for life. As a dentist, you work for yourself or work for a dental practice as a contractor. The money is good in dentistry but job security is not. Also, dentistry is soooo boring - cleaning teeth and fillings make up 80% of the job with extractions making the other 20%. Yawn.

If you go into medicine there are 34 specialities and a further 80 sub-specialities so you are bound to find an area that interests you.
Reply 3
I did do work experience for dentistry but dont know how to go about doing one with medicine.

Do you know what specialities provide a good work-life balance? (apart from a gp of course)
Reply 4
Original post by mike23mike
Doctor wins hands down. The dentists have been living on their savings during Covid. As a doctor, you work for the NHS so you have a job for life. As a dentist, you work for yourself or work for a dental practice as a contractor. The money is good in dentistry but job security is not. Also, dentistry is soooo boring - cleaning teeth and fillings make up 80% of the job with extractions making the other 20%. Yawn.

If you go into medicine there are 34 specialities and a further 80 sub-specialities so you are bound to find an area that interests you.


That's one thing that interests me about medicine; the fact there are so many specialities to choose from. But I'm always turned to dentistry because how less time it takes compared to medince to graduate and be employable.
Reply 5
How long did it take you to become neurologist?
I hadn't considered public health as an option before so thank you!

And thank you for the link to the thread!
Reply 6
Woah that's a long time! That would have taken a lot of dedication but working must be really rewarding now. Thank you again for all your help!
Why not both, become an oral and maxillofacial surgeon...you weren't planning to do anything with the next 20 years of your life right? :wink:
I'm not a doctor but my understanding is the work-life balance and stress in medicine is more variable based on what field of medicine you enter.

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