A young woman from Generation Z decided against becoming a doctor after completing her medical studies. Instead, she started her new dream job as a part-time job.
Lexis Czumak-Abreu from New York State was supposed to be a doctor, but ultimately decided on a completely different career path and became an electrician. She talks to Business Insider about her unusual career.
She was originally interested in medicine because her mother was a doctor’s assistant. But while specializing in phlebotomy (blood sampling), she realized that dealing with patients wasn’t for her; she “absolutely hated it.” She confesses to “Business Insider”: “I’m not a humanitarian. I’m not cut out for this job.”
Parallel to her studies, she worked as a fitness trainer and also did simple electrical work. She enjoyed this job so much that she finally said goodbye to the healthcare sector after completing her studies in 2019. According to “Business Insider,” she then worked full-time as an electrician and found her calling there.
No two working days are the same today, she explained to the newspaper. Instead of going to the same office every day, she works in many different places, constantly experiences new situations and always meets different people. She tells her followers about her varied everyday work life on social media. She is followed by 730,000 people on Instagram alone.
But her dream job also has its downsides. Lexis tells “Business Insider” about sexism, occasional electric shocks and the physically demanding work: “I have to train in the gym to keep up with the men in the industry.” Nevertheless, she is happy about the exciting work and the regular working hours. She rules out a return to the medical profession.
The phenomenon that medical students do not want to work as doctors can also be observed in German-speaking countries. A survey on career goals by the Hesse State Medical Association in 2004 showed that 76 percent of students in the third examination section did not want to work as a doctor at all, or did not want to work in Germany.
The main destination of the medical students in the survey was Switzerland. According to a report in the “Neue Züricher Zeitung”, the Alpine republic has similar problems. The newspaper cites a survey by the Association of Swiss Medical Students (Swimsa) from 2023, according to which a third of students have doubts about taking up the medical profession. The main reason is the poor work-life balance and the stressful studies.
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