If you’re a physician looking to leave medicine or simply supplement your income with a side hustle, many possible options can make use of your valuable skillset. Whatever the reason for needing a change, from working too many hours for too little pay to a practice closing, there’s no time like the present to look into leveraging your expertise and passions in new ways.
In an article for Wheel Health, “Alternative Career Ideas for Burned Out Physicians,” alternative physician careers are examined, and in a recent Finity Group article, eight potential side hustles are described. We have taken some of the best career opportunities from each of these articles to come up with a top 5 list, in no particular order:
- Medical Education – If you want to share your knowledge and inspire the next generation of healthcare professionals, medical education may be for you. Whether it’s joining university faculty, developing a course curriculum, or working on Continuing Medical Education (CME) programs, there are plenty of options if you have a passion for education.
- Medical Writing/Communications – Whether the client is a medical publication looking for the next great article or a pharmaceutical company looking to market a new drug, there is no shortage of outlets if writing is your passion. If you’re a good editor, you can edit textbooks, develop test prep materials, peer review articles, and more. Writing and editing work tends to offer the most flexibility in terms of hours and overall commitment needed, so such positions are ideal side hustles.
- Expert Witness/Medical Malpractice Expert – As a medical expert, you can help defend physician decisions or support patients who have been mistreated. If you value justice and you’re good under cross-examination and other legal pressures, this can be one of the more lucrative alternative employment opportunities, with both flat retainer and hourly fee options.
- Healthcare Consulting – Whether it’s at a hospital, pharmaceutical company, physician group, lab, government agency, medical device company, or non-profit, healthcare consultants are in high demand. The list of healthcare consulting options is varied and includes advising on technology integration, mergers and acquisitions, financial management, research and product development, and healthcare consumption.
- Finance Jobs – Venture capital funds often leverage physicians to advise on the viability of healthcare investments. Healthcare nonprofits use physicians for fundraising assistance. Biotech, pharmaceutical, and medical device companies seek physician expertise as industry analysts. In short, numerous options are available for those physicians with a solid understanding of finance to go along with their medical expertise.
These five career opportunities are by no means exhaustive but do provide excellent examples of the opportunities available to physicians. Even if you’re not looking to replace your primary employment, many make ideal supplements and can offer a refreshing change of pace from your usual your day-to-day demands.
