3 ms·

That surprises me, since I had heard being an oncologist is a very hard job because of all the bad news. I guess doing the research rather than the practice is

• hkmurakami 7y ago
  Not OP, but clinical practice and research are indeed very different.
• randycupertino 7y ago
  I'm not an oncologist (heh...), more just a data guy who works with the researchers and helps them with genetic typing to build outputs with the tumor sample analysis. Sounds fancy but sometimes I'm just even doing plain old IT support (because I'm there in the labs and having to put in a ticket and wait for hospital IT is a pita). I do work with a lot of oncologists and while like any industry there are a few big egos and jerks the majority of them are simply amazing people. I've seen patient's families screaming and yelling at our PIs (literally spitting on their faces) and the Drs. stay calm, cool and professional. It's hard to be the ones delivering bad news but they do a great job. Most of the MDs I work with are both researchers and regular oncologist physicians. They participate in clinical trials and have labs where they investigate new treatments and drugs, but they also provide standard of care treatments for patients who aren't eligible or choose not to participate in trials.