- Four-year bachelor's degree, in-state public
- Roughly $11,000 to $15,000 a year in tuition and fees
- Medical school, four years
- Commonly $40,000 to $70,000 a year all in, less at a public school in your own state
- The MCAT (medical school admission test), applications and interviews
- $3,000 to $7,000 once you count travel and applying to twenty schools
- Licensing and board exams
- Three steps of the United States Medical Licensing Examination, roughly $1,000 each, then board exams in internal medicine and again in hematology
Roughly, all in
$190,000 to $345,000
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
The low end is an in state public university for the bachelor's degree, then a public medical school in your own state, plus the MCAT (Medical College Admission Test), applications and the three steps of the national licensing exam. The high end is a private or out of state medical school at up to $70,000 a year all in. There are also two sets of board exams, first in internal medicine and again in hematology, adding several thousand dollars. Residency and fellowship are paid jobs, so the years after medical school add no tuition, and interest on what you borrow is not counted in these figures.
Most graduates borrow, and the debt is large. Two things blunt it: Public Service Loan Forgiveness, where residency and fellowship years at a nonprofit hospital count toward the ten years of qualifying payments, and the fact that the specialty earns enough afterward to clear the rest.