is it 8 or 12 years you go to school to become a doctor?

Answer 1

4 years college
4 years med school
3-6 years residency dependeing on specialty

Answer 2

See Zak's answer above, but I'll expand on it:

In order to go to medical school in the United States, you need a college degree. People typically take at least 4 years to complete this. I went much much longer.

US "allopathic" medical schools are 4 years. There are also "osteopathic" medical schools, but if you go to one of these, you earn the degree D.O., instead of M.D. DO schools typically require that you do one more year of DO internship before you can get a medical license. DO's have to do this, and then if they want further training, they start at the intern level again. For this reason, DO training is effectively 5 years. DO schools may be easier to get into for those with less-than-perfect college records, but then afterward they are at a competitive disadvantage getting into post graduate residency training programs.

Another way through med school is to leave the US. US citizens sometimes go to Mexico or into the Carribean and do med school there. Some of these programs are excellent, but after 4 years down there, they still have to do a "5th pathway" year in the US in order to be eligible for licenses. Again, this makes med school effectively 5 years. Again, these students are at a competitive disadvantage when seeking further training in the united states.

Residency is post graduate medical education in areas of specialty, which then lead to the ability to be a board certified practitioner of the specialty in question.

Residency is a stage in a doctor's training where they are earning money, working in the field of their interest, while continuing to get on-the-job training and supervision. Residency is in some ways still school and in other ways not. Like was said above, the minimum is about 3 years to learn how to do family medicine or internal medicine, and the maximum would be well over 8 years, with doing 5 years of surgical training and up to 3 years of subspecialty surgical training like heart surgery. Many of these doctors will also spend additional years performing research during their training, or will undergo even more years of specialized training in order to learn special techniques.

Bottom line: A career in medicine is a lifelong committment to learning! ...thats no joke.

Answer 3

I'm thinking it's 8 with another 4 as a resident in a hospital.

Answer 4

i think it is 4 years of college 4 years of med school and another 4 years as an intern and helping out at the hospital

Answer 5

I think it is 8. 4 premed, and 2 medical school and 2 as an intern.

Answer 6

After you graduate from high school you're looking at 12-years to your practice.

Answer 7

8 years...4 college yrs and 4 medical school...: )