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As a professional viola player, Han Dewan has performed and recorded with various quartets and was the principal violist with the West Texas Symphony. But Dewan, of Rockville, Maryland, first thought about becoming a physician when she learned how common hearing loss is among musicians while studying music and business at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee.
“Every year in music school, they would give presentations on hearing loss prevention, and they’d say that ‘75% of you already have irreversible hearing loss,’” she said. “I was so struck by that.”
The revelation led her to take music as far as she could professionally, then complete a postbaccalaureate premed program at Goucher College in Towson, Maryland, and ultimately enter the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore in 2022. She will start her fourth year of medical school this July after spending a year with a research lab studying mouse genes, hearing, and balance development. She intends to become an otolaryngologist, pursue a surgical residency, and continue her research on hearing loss.
Students who enroll in medical school several years after graduating from college, after another career, or who are older, already married, or parents are considered nontraditional students compared with those who attend shortly after their undergraduate years, which helps make the medical school environment more supportive and flexible.
According to the Association of American Medical Colleges, 73% of med students take at least 1 gap year; 44% take 2 or more gap years; 10% are 25 or older; 1-3% are over 30; and 3%-5% are parents.
Those who begin their journey to becoming a doctor with a prior career, with a spouse, during a pregnancy, and/or with children in tow are helping to reshape a medical school atmosphere that has historically been laser-focused on the physician career path and little else. But nontraditional med students can help everyone become better doctors by bringing a unique set of soft skills and diverse perspectives that elevate the entire cohort. They can help everyone become better doctors by shifting the focus from rote memorization to holistic, human-centric care.
About Medscape Insights
Medscape continually surveys physicians and other medical professionals about key practice challenges and current issues, creating high-impact analyses. For example, Medscape’s Medical School Stressors Report 2025 found that:
- 82% of med students surveyed found studying highly or moderately stressful.
- 51% of surveyed students said they are frequently or constantly burned out.
- 22% of those students said they were depressed.
Aside from starting med school after pursuing music, Dewan met and married her now-husband, Kyle Rosales, and a year ago welcomed boy-girl twins. As they dated before marrying in 2024, the couple had many conversations about how the next 10 years would look.
“He was definitely understandably skeptical, but we knew that our relationship, and our understanding was that life wasn’t going to stop for medical training,” she said. “That was definitely a big factor in our decision to grow our family during medical school.”
Rosales works consistent hours from home as a programmer with his longtime employer. The couple has a full-time nanny and relied on Dewan’s mom to help with the twins full-time until they were 6 months old. “When I have more demanding rotations, she will probably return,” by necessity, Dewan said. “It would mean a lot to have access to extended childcare for residents and medical students for hours not typically covered by daycare hours,” she said.
The support is valuable, particularly from her husband. “He is the real hero of the story,” she said. “He has been such a rock in our relationship before kids, and a real wonderful dad.”
Worth the Wait
For Jessica Johnston, of Pasadena, California, entering medical school after several years of working and other studies helped her decide that medical school was the right choice. Currently a first-year student at Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine in Pasadena, California, Johnston graduated from the University of California, Davis, with a psychiatry degree in 2018, earned a master’s degree in public health from the same school 2 years later, and worked for several years doing public health research, analysis, and program management in various settings.
“Medical school had been on my mind throughout undergrad, but upon finishing, I had this interest in public health and community-based medicine,” she said. “Medical school is a huge commitment in time, money, and even emotionally. I wanted to make sure that this was definitely the commitment I wanted to make….I found it really fulfilling and enjoyed working at the community level on research projects, but I really missed having personal interactions with patients.”
In 2020, Johnston married her spouse, Linda, who works full-time doing statistical analysis for a healthcare research team. The couple talked a lot about where Johnston would apply to medical school, how relocating would affect Linda’s career prospects, and the realities of living on one income. Today, Johnston credits Linda with managing their busy household, which includes two rescue dogs, Penny and Bren, and two cats, Lily and Albus.
“Time is always a constraint and an ongoing challenge, and as I get more clinical responsibilities, there is less time at home,” Johnston said. “One of the most challenging things is recognizing that this is a huge sacrifice for us both. So even if I’m exhausted, I’m going to do my part to show up as a partner and do the dishes. We have hard days in class and then to come home and to want to balance being fully supportive of what she’s doing and showing up for her in our relationship” is a priority.
“Taking the time and having the life experience accumulate along the way, made it clear what my values are and what I want for the future,” said Johnston, who plans to go into psychiatry in a community-based setting, offering holistic care and advocating for better mental health care for all. “I’ve had a little more clarity in being able to decide what’s truly important to invest my time in,”
Helping Expand Options for Med School Parents
A 2021 study in the journal Academic Medicine found that about 7% of all medical students graduate with what is called “a nonspouse dependent,” likely a child or children, according to statistics compiled annually by the Association of American Medical Colleges.
About 2%-2.5% enter medical school with a nonspouse dependent, said Shayla Durfey, MD, ScM, an NICU fellow and physician at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, and the study’s lead author. What has changed is that more women than men attend medical school — about 57% now compared with 50% earlier in the decade, she said . And with more female medical students comes more visibility with pregnancy and parenting.
“People who give birth are increasing in percentage in medical school over time, and as the age of medical students has gone up, naturally, people who become pregnant are more visible,” said Durfey. “That visibility breeds acceptance in a lot of ways, and that leads to change. Because people who are pregnant expect to have some elements of support, and medical schools have to rise to the occasion.”
Durfey, who entered medical school at Brown in 2015, had her first child during her first year, her second during her fourth year, and her third while in residency. After her first, she wrote a handbook for parents in medical school at Brown in 2017, then sent it to other US medical schools that indicated interest. Since then, Durfey said she has seen more medical schools address parents’ needs such as parental leave policies, lactation accommodations, and offer flexibility when choosing clinical sites where medical students go to learn to reduce their travel time.
“I think schools are getting better at providing accommodations, but I don’t think that there are requirements for them to provide those accommodations,” she said. She has also heard from medical students about how they do not feel supported in their programs. “There’s so much variability, and there’s not really a one-size-fits-all approach because medical schools all function so differently,” she added. “In general, there are periods of time in medical school that are inflexible and periods of time that are flexible. I think some schools do a better job at working with students within flexible periods of time in medical school to make it work for their lives.”
Such increased visibility has also helped nontraditional students find community, said Dewan. She has learned tips from other medical student parents about things such as how to ask for certain accommodations and what the code for the school’s lactation room is. “People are given space to parent out loud, and we have found each other that way,” she said.
Being supported in medical school makes it a pleasure to return to your family at the end of the day. “I love going home to my family...I know every day I’m going to laugh so hard at something they do. They are always goofing off, and it is such a nice thing to go home and be Mommy.”
Tips for Nontraditional Students in Med School
- When choosing a med school as a nontraditional student, consider the proportion of students who are nontraditional vs those entering medical school directly from undergraduate programs. This proportion may indicate the culture of the school and the supports available.
- Seek out mentorship or advice from physicians who had similar circumstances during medical school.
- Bonding with other nontraditional students who understand the challenges of balancing dual identities can help you feel welcome and part of the medical school community.
“Most schools recognize that their students come from all walks of life and provide opportunities for students to connect outside of class. If the class size is large enough, there may be groups for partnered students, or for student-parents, or for older students who have had significant careers before medical school,” said Anne Eacker, senior associate dean for student affairs at Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine.
Cheryl Alkon is a seasoned writer covering healthcare and medicine. She is the author of the book “Balancing Pregnancy with Pre-Existing Diabetes: Healthy Mom, Healthy Baby.” Find her at CherylAlkon.com.
