I can verify that this is correct. I am an Interventional Cardiology Registrar (ST7) in the UK, soon to be Consultant in 10 months' time (then balik Malaysia yahoo!) and it is a long training process. Gruelling, competitive, but I thrive on that so it was okay for me. Medicine / surgery is not for everyone. Don't think about the money only as someone wise told me once "no matter how rich you are, you can only eat 3 plates of koay teow a day".

I have been contacted by private hospitals back home offering good pay - 20K basic then after 6 months of settling in and building your practice, they claim they can pay 70K/month. If you bring in more work, the top guys in their hospital are earning 150K.

Cannot wait to come home. People jokingly say "hujan emas di negara orang, hujan batu di negara sendiri, lebih baik di negara sendiri" but I can tell you hand on heart, that is so so true once you have spent half of your adult life abroad.

Training process in the UK can be summed up in one word - organised. See, the content and exposure is probably just as good in Malaysia, but as is often the case with us as a nation (and this is a problem with other Asian countries too except maybe Singapore), we struggle with organising things and making things run well.

As a junior in the UK you get paid well, but as as a consultant you do not, in comparison to what you get paid as a consultant in Malaysia. In Malaysia, junior pay is shite for what you do, but consultant pay is damn too high for what you do.

I'll illustrate:

As a final year trainee (I graduated in 2010 and have therefore worked > 10 years - 2 years houseman, 2 years MO, 5 years registrar and an extra 2 years of a higher research degree i.e MD/PhD) I am now taking home 3900 GBP a month i.e. 20K ringgit.

As a consultant, normally first take home pay is around 4000 - 4400 GBP a month i.e. around 23K ringgit. This goes up every year for the first 5 years as a consultant by a few hundred pounds a month until the 5th year after which it plateaus. To get further rises, you have to get discretionary "points" - e.g. you improve a service in your department, or teach students, etc2. Basically extra stuff.

This of course means f*** all when you take into account the cost of living, so it is not quite a like for like comparison with Malaysia but you can see how the consultants here are not getting paid as well, compared to say someone in Pantai who can easily make 70K a month by doing very straightforward, less risky procedures (this tends to be the case as the indemnity is higher privately if you take on high risk patients and most people avoid this).

In summary, junior years are great here, consultant years are better in Malaysia. Having flexibility to move around is key in this profession, as with most things. This does require you to be good at what you do.

And before I forget, please do not view medicine/surgery as a way to be wealthy. The way to look at it is - you will never be poor. You can never say never of course because if you are an idiot and gamble away your wealth Bill Gates can also be poor! But the point here is, the stability that the profession provides is unrivalled. Covid-19 brings this to the fore and is a good example. I thank God every day that although my job is hard, I am still able to have a job anywhere in the world I go. When you go for your 20 year reunion you might not be the richest in your batch, but you certainly won't struggle. You might still make millions of course if you bantai lots of private work (some unethically!) , but the happiness that the stability provides while caring for patients is unrivalled in my view. Not to mention the intellectual stimulation.

This post has been edited by bauer: Sep 11 2020, 11:18 PM

Nice one, I am in the same boat, but in the UK. Family is most important - a fact that not many appreciate, until you have been away for a very long time.

I am in the midst of planning my return home in the next year or so, currently about to start a post CCT complex PCI fellowship in Bristol. My view/understanding is that it is very unusual to come home straight to private practice (although possible) if you have never worked in Malaysia before. The reason for this is there are some nuances about practising here that might not be apparent to us and a period of adjustment will do us good and the patients justice as well.

For that reason, a Uni environment is the best middle ground (they have private wings now so you can split your working time between Uni and private and the earning potential is decent) and it gives you the chance to earn as well as teach/do research/find your feet when you come home having previously worked in a completely different working environment. At least that's what I am planning to do. You can then understand the lie of the land and decide what you want to do long-term once you have settled down.

It just so happens that I am in KL this month on leave and have arranged visits to UMMC and UITM to see how things are. Happy to be PM'd.

Never thought I would meet a fellow interventional cardiologist on Lowyat!

This post has been edited by bauer: Oct 17 2021, 05:39 PM