There's a lot to attend to when you're an attending physician. Attending physicians not only enjoy practicing medicine but also enjoy passing down knowledge to others. The attending physician has two main responsibilities: patient care and teaching/supervising fellows, residents, and medical students.
An attending physician is considered an expert in their particular field of medicine or surgery. Some of the responsibilities of the attending physician include directing the care of the patient, reviewing treatment plans with residents, and documenting supervision of the patient's management. To excel as an attending physician, you'll need thorough medical knowledge, the ability to provide compassionate, appropriate, and effective patient care, and an understanding of practice-based learning.
If you're interested in becoming an Attending Physician, you'll need to complete medical school and an accredited residency program. In addition, you'll usually have to obtain specialty board certification. Teaching Attendings often have additional fellowship training as well as faculty appointments.
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being an Attending Physician. For example, did you know that they make an average of $75.32 an hour? That's $156,663 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 7% and produce 55,400 job opportunities across the U.S.
There are certain skills that many Attending Physicians have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed Communication skills, Compassion and Detail oriented.
If you're interested in becoming an Attending Physician, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 32.5% of Attending Physicians have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 8.3% of Attending Physicians have master's degrees. Even though most Attending Physicians have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become an Attending Physician. When we researched the most common majors for an Attending Physician, we found that they most commonly earn Bachelor's Degree degrees or Doctoral Degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on Attending Physician resumes include Associate Degree degrees or Master's Degree degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become an Attending Physician. In fact, many Attending Physician jobs require experience in a role such as Physician Assistant. Meanwhile, many Attending Physicians also have previous career experience in roles such as Medical Assistant or Physician.