Additional Information
It takes a lot of education to become any kind of doctor, and this is
no less true for ophthalmologists. In the U.S., an ophthalmologist must complete
four years of college for their pre-med education followed by four or more
years of medical school. They then have at least four years of residency training.
"You must enjoy physics," says pediatric ophthalmologist Dr. James Reynolds.
"Most of medicine is chemistry, but most of ophthalmology is physics."
"Ophthalmology is a very popular specialty, and there is a perception
that it's one of the more difficult specialties to get into," says Dr. Kevin
Gregory-Evans. He's an ophthalmologist.
"That's true in Canada, it's true in the U.S., and it's true in the U.K.,"
says Dr. Gregory-Evans. "But one thing that people often forget is that the
specialty of ophthalmology is huge.... It is a very big specialty [and] getting
into the training programs can be tricky."
"Ophthalmology is a competitive field to get into within medicine," says
ophthalmologist Denise Gallagher. "You have to have top grades, tests scores
and board scores in medical school to be able to get into an ophthalmology
residency training program."