For any type of professional, the start of their career can be an exciting time, but one that certainly isn’t without its difficulties. Young doctors in particular can face a lot of challenges as they are getting their careers off the ground.
Among the challenges they can face are financial challenges from the student loans they have built up. A person can end up acquiring quite a bit of student debt over the course of attending medical school. One question a young physician who is carrying a lot of debt may have is: Are there programs out there for helping doctors repay their loans?
There are programs which provide loan repayment assistance for physicians who take positions in underserved areas. Wisconsin has such a program. It is called the Health Professions Loan Assistance program. Under this program, physicians who practice in certain underserved parts of the state can get as much as $100,000 in loan repayment assistance over three years.
As a note, the program has a variety of different rules and requirements. This includes rules on: what is a qualifying underserved area, what sort of site a doctor has to work at to qualify, what types of physicians can qualify and the workload level a physician has to take on to be eligible.
Another difficulty physicians can face as they are starting their career is challenges with getting contracts consistent with their overall interests in their early jobs. Physician employment contracts can be remarkably complex. Intimidation over this complexity and fear of not having much bargaining power because they are new to the field might lead a young physician to accept whatever contract they are offered without much in the way of negotiation.
However, the terms of the employment contracts they agree to can having major implications, both financially and on the long-term direction of their career, for a physician. So, when it comes to such contracts, careful review and negotiation can be important for any doctor, whether they are new to the field or have been practicing for decades. Skilled health law attorneys can provide physicians, new or experienced, with assistance with such review and negotiation.
Source: Wisconsin Department of Health Services, “Primary Care Loan Repayment Recruitment Resources for Health Professional Shortage Areas in Wisconsin,” Accessed Sept. 27, 2016
