Non Clinical Doctor Jobs Could Be More Impactful On Healthcare

Graduating from one of the top medical colleges in India, most aspire to bring change and make an everlasting impact on healthcare. How far has your clinical practice helped you achieve your aspiration? Most likely, your impact will be one-to-one on patients that you consult. Your contribution to everlasting systemic changes could likely be low. If you aspire to make this kind of impact, have you explored non-clinical doctor jobs?

We can feel the motivation of an 18-year-old who wants to heal people, make the world a better place. However, professional impact as a clinician is usually directly proportional to the number of patients you advise. This has obvious limits. However, if you still have the itch, several options have emerged in non clinical careers to explore. After a medical degree from the top medical colleges in India, doctors are exploring alternate non-clinical doctor jobs. The desire to create a greater impact is the main motivation.

These non-clinical doctor jobs have the time, resources, and power to foster institutional changes. Changes that have an exponential impact, even when you aren’t working yourself. The key differentiator is that non-clinical jobs focus on driving systemic changes that accumulate and build up over time.

After having worked hard for a medical degree from the top medical colleges in India, the process of transition could be daunting. Peer and societal pressure add to the problem of decision making. It is important for you to approach the transition in a systematic manner. A first step could be to start with research on non-clinical courses after MBBS.

Multiplicity in non clinical doctor jobs

Non-clinical doctor jobs in administration, public health, informatics, entrepreneurship, research, biomedical engineering, design, insurance, government agencies, not-for-profit, and academia could be some areas worth mentioning. Students can enter these professions with the right course after MBBS or any other medical degree from the top medical colleges in India.

Unboxing the unrealised impact potential in non-clinical doctor jobs

Let’s consider a simple example of non-clinical doctor jobs :
A hospital administrator could work to reduce the waiting times in a hospital OPD. In a hospital with 200 doctors, with an average OPD of 15 patients per doctor, the waiting time is reduced by 30 mins. You can calculate the impact in a year. Even if the administrator leaves, the results will continue. That is the beauty of it. Further, the next administrator could make it even more efficient by building on top of it. Morbidity and mortality rates can be reduced with infection control and devising similar protocols in emergency conditions.

Numerous such examples can be quoted for other non-clinical doctor jobs, careers in management, public health, policy, communication, informatics, education, knowledge systems, data sciences, or bioengineering. Moreover, clinical Research has received great media attention in recent days for its impact potential.

The unused potential of non-clinical careers

Indian clinicians are always applauded for their quality work globally. However, our healthcare indicators do not reflect that. We need more courses after MBBS in non-clinical fields and the top medical colleges in India need to also start looking into these. The current number is nowhere compatible with the degree of impact the country is capable of.
It is imperative to drive talent to develop human resource capacities for systemic changes in healthcare. Non-clinical doctor jobs have a higher potential for improving access, quality, and efficacy of the healthcare system. Clinicians opting for these careers could be leaders driving this change, as in some developed healthcare ecosystems.