CRNA or MD?

[Vagon]

Hey all, i'm currently an 18 year old male going to nursing school for his LPN. I plan on immediately going for my RN, but its there where I get confused. Heres the deal, I could go on and get my BSN and head out to a CRNA school, which would be amazing money and I enjoy what i've seen and researched about the field. Or, once I got my RN, I could work on getting into a Med school.

Here or overseas, it doesn't matter much where to me. I don't doubt that I have the brains for it, but 11 years is a very long time. I'd like to get into anesthesiology if I went down this path. Keep in mind after my RN I don't really care about money as much as the line of work, and while I think i'd prefer getting my MD it just seems to far away from me right now. I grew up with no money, so thats why I went into nursing in the first place besides my interest in medicine.

Thoughts? Input? Thanks!

[Corey Narry, MSN, RN, NP]

Given the information you had in your post especially when you said that income is not a major consideration for you, I believe your best bet is the CRNA route.

The amount of time you will need to reach your CRNA goal is much shorter - finish LPN, then ADN, work in ICU for at least 1 year, finish your BSN at the same time you are working in ICU, take the GRE, then apply to CRNA school. Approximately 6 years I would suppose!

On the other hand, your goal for being an anesthesiologist will require 4 years of bachelor's degree to meet pre-med requirements, take MCAT, study for 4 years of medical school, pass the USMLE, then apply for 4-year residency in anesthesiology. That's 12 years of both school and post-graduate training combined!

You also mentioned that it doesn't matter where you obtain your medical degree if you decide to pursue this route. Anesthesiology residencies can be very competitive making it more difficult for foreign-educated medical graduates to earn a slot so this is something you may need to think about.