Anyone know about biomedical engineering?

ixchel · May 18, 2014

I'm absolutely fascinated by biomedicals. But as a career, it's extremely different from nursing. What are you hoping to get out of your career? Are you hoping to directly implement patient care? Or are you more interested in technology and research? I do believe this field is going to explode rapidly as research gets better at it. Hopefully biosimilars start to gain traction soon in the US as well. That'll be a real breakthrough - gaining access for more people because cost will be less in the long run. I have a feeling the market (along with research into more treatments) will boom once the US allows it.

Another thing to ponder is the type of science involved. I admit I don't know the whole scope of educational focus for biomedical research and engineering. I imagine it is very biology and chemistry focused, though. Much more than nursing. If you struggle a lot with chem, that might answer this question for you without much debate.

Gdream · May 18, 2014

Hi, thanks for the response.

I have heard about the field that it has great potential to rise, that they are the new power next to pharm. field. I haven't thought seriously about which career I'd want to get into, but researching, thus being able to build own company in the end seemed attractive to me.

Because nursing takes so much energy now that it is so competitive, I was thinking about putting the same energy to this field..

EricJRN, MSN, RN · May 18, 2014

I agree with the previous poster. I think you need to look at what is important to you in a career. I think it's also important to assess your academic strengths and weaknesses.

I started college as a bioengineering major with the intention of going to medical school. I have always been okay at math, but I never loved it. I disliked physics and computer programming when I took them in high school. Bioengineering sounded really cool, but I found that it was really intensive on math, physics and programming. That was a terrible combination for me, so I got out of the program after my second semester.

ixchel · May 18, 2014

Hi, thanks for the response.
I have heard about the field that it has great potential to rise, that they are the new power next to pharm. field. I haven't thought seriously about which career I'd want to get into, but researching, thus being able to build own company in the end seemed attractive to me.
Because nursing takes so much energy now that it is so competitive, I was thinking about putting the same energy to this field..

Research and business ownership can be part of nursing as well, but it certainly won't have the same glory or income. ?

Do you have any friends or family who are nurses, and who you trust to give an honest view of nursing? If so, you might ask if you could shadow with them for a day. Also ask them about their experiences afterwards. Are the benefits something you might feel are worth it? Are the risks and frustrations worth it?

I imagine there is great triumph in biomed as well, but I also imagine the wait for that is longer and you have a lot of monotony.

Another thought - look at the course catalog at the courses you would take. What sounds more interesting to you?

NurseGirl525, ASN, RN · May 18, 2014

I think biomedical engineering would be a fascinating field. I loved micro and I love learning about the disease process. If I had it to do all over again I would have probably been a microbiologist or immunologist. I would sit down and do some research on it.

notnursezelda · May 20, 2014

i have several biomedical engineering friends, (some with masters) who are having a tough time finding a job

i also know there are plenty of nurses who are also having that same trouble

its all a matter of what you want to pursue, will be happy doing for a long time and can make a career out of.

both are tough, and a different kind of tough. make a list!

biomedical_eng · Oct 12, 2020

I'm a Biomedical engineer (BME). I know this is an old thread but I thought I'd throw in some info for future researchers.

From my perspective as an engineer and pre-healthcare student (Pre-Dental) compared to my biology and other degree friends, there is very little biology or medicine in biomedical engineering. A few programs do offer more of a medical slant but in the end, it's engineering which means it's not a flexible curriculum (don't be fooled) and it's a bunch of math classes.

How many math classes you ask?

Differential calculus, integral calculus, vector calculus; differential equations (calculus but pattern recognition and proofs); Linear Algebra (not the algebra you're all thinking of); Newtonian statics (a lot of trigonometry, matrices, differential, & integral calculus); newtonian dynamics (a lot of trigonometry, matrices, differential, integral, & vector calculus); fluid dynamics (a lot of trigonometry, matrices, differential, integral, & vector calculus); thermodynamics (matrices, differential, integral, & vector calculus); mechanics of deformable bodies (matrices, differential, integral, & vector calculus). You also do calculus based physics 1 & 2. Both of your inorganic Chemistry classes carry a lot of calculus and differential equations. You're not getting away with plain old general Chemistry. You need Principles of Chemistry which is way more math and algorithm heavy. Depending on your school, if you are pre-professional or heavy chemical/cellular you may need Organic Chemistry 1 & 2 (reaction rates need a lot of linearization and some calculus) as well as a biochemistry class (reaction rates so some differential calculus). Then of course there is the obligatory calculus based statistics class.

Then after all of that, there are the computer coding classes disguised as "engineering problem solving." They're mostly computer coding these days so it can include a lot of math at times. Device design is more electrical engineering in disguise and that by nature can not only be math heavy, but math heavy in calculus working with imaginary numbers and phasors. If your school requires it, bio-infomatics is more coding and data analytics than anything and bio-imaging is a ton of physics based math.

Also consider the fact that most schools don't even require an anatomy class. Many times it's an elective. Foundations of Biology is that pre-med weed out class on the way to it's counter part; Diversity of form and function. I've done anatomy and human physiology at both the community college and the university levels. I will guarantee that human physiology at the 4 year level is way more involved. Imagine a bunch of pre-professionals competing with each other... I will say that anatomy at the community college was a way better education on the subject than at the university.

The theme here is there are concepts but most if not all of the concepts all get boiled down to the math equation of the day. That's the "right of passage" you have to endure.

Biomedical Engineering is a great pre-graduate school program on your resume next to your GRE scores. I know we're talking about nursing but let me give a little perspective that might bring things into focus for some.

I would say that time management and raw science wise, not much else would prepare a person for medical, dental, PT, pharmd school etc.. 19 semester hours is the beginning of full time in engineering at my state school. 24+ semester hours per semester is normal for pre-healthcare majors and that doesn't count the fact that you'll probably have 2-4 lab classes for the freshman, sophomore, and junior semesters. They contain 1 hour discussions and 3 hour labs that don't factor into your course load. Also, professional seminars don't count towards your course load either but are mandatory. They're basically 1 hour lectures. With all of that, you could end up in classrooms alone 30-40 hours a week easily. Squeeze in your homework, group white papers, work, food, etc later on your own time LOL.

Would I say it's a great pre-professional degree from the student and GPA stand point... Hell no! I have a great GPA, but looking back on it, why take the beating to get to the same place. My friends that went to medical and dental schools describe those professional programs as "enjoyable" and "a nice change of pace from the engineering school rat race." They now like school again.

Is there any cross over from nursing or healthcare??? People can always shoe-horn a correlation between anything. Take the increase in cell phone usage and the growth of the stray cat population... Remember the idea "correlation isn't causation" anyone.?.? In my experience, many of the engineering students just wanted to avoid people and stay within their group. That's the opposite to nursing. Would your nursing experience count for much going the other way? I think you should ask yourself instead, "do you have enough science education to gain an engineers attention enough to listen to you?" That's a pessimistic point of view, but I think a valid one for anyone thinking of changing over. Do you want to solve problems??? Insurance and lawsuits rule the world to a point. No company is really going to trust much to an undergrad/jack of all trades BME.

Notice I didn't mention biomechanics or implant design??? For a degree where the majority of graduates go on the professional or grad schools, the mechanical engineering aspect of those last two fields I mentioned can be a little ignored. I personally focused on cardiovascular implant, cardiovascular fluid dynamics, and skeletal materials and implant design. That involves computational fluid dynamics computer aided design and finite element analysis.

As a biomedical engineering graduate, schools will paint a picture of infinite possibilities and the fact that you personally will help the lives of millions. The reality is we're all pouring into the 8-10 same companies across the U.S..

I'd say from experience that 85-90% of the engineering jobs out there are not available to you. Schools will argue that fact, however it's not them in the workforce fighting the stigma or lack of knowledge of what a BME is or learned in school. Beware of people giving assumptions and "common knowledge" about the field or job market as facts. If they haven't worked in it, they probably think a lot of things about BME, but are these ideas facts or assumptions?

That's just my perception but it is from the literally hundreds of HR people that responded to me in both rejection letters and given feed back. I'm not kidding; hundreds. You are too much of an engineer to be a biologist, and too much of a biologist to be an engineer. To date, I have never been considered for an implant design or analysis job and those jobs have almost exclusively gone to chemical, industrial or mechanical engineers. For me and my classmates, engineering was mostly meetings and excel spread sheets in a cubical. In my social circle we were all 3.7-4.1 GPA students. BME was an over achiever degree for sure. I sat about in the middle of that range. None of us have done anything of consequence that we feel and I also think we're all getting out of engineering but I could be wrong on that point.

After going through all of that, In 3.5 years, I was laid off from departments that closed twice and a third time during a company downsizing cut back. My education cost more than twice as much as my girlfriends nursing degree and she has consistently made 2 to 1.5 times more than me salary wise AND she has never been without work.

Some people are born for engineering and make it work... If that is you I wish you all the best!