The RICH DOCTOR Index
Ten dimensions of a medical life.
A framework for thinking about the life you have and the one you want. It is not a test and it gives no score: ten parts of a life, four honest questions about each, and some reading for the road.
Begin your reflectionRead the ten dimensions
About ten minutes. Your answers stay in this browser; nothing is sent to us.
An index, not a score
Rich has never meant only one thing.
At the back of a good book, the index does not grade anything. It lists the subjects that matter and tells you where to look. This is an index in that older sense: ten parts of a medical life, each worth looking at honestly.
Nobody is rich in all ten at once. A medical career trades some of them against others, often without anyone deciding to: time for training, place for a seat, health for an exam. The point is not to fill every dimension. It is to notice which ones matter to you, and to make the trades on purpose.
No score
There are no points, totals or percentages. A life cannot be added up, and we will not pretend otherwise.
No verdict
Nothing here tells you your life is good or bad. Every option in every question is a legitimate answer.
Not a test
This is an editorial framework for reflection. It has not been scientifically validated, and it is not a psychological or medical assessment.
Private by design
Your answers stay in this browser. Nothing is sent to us or stored on our servers. You can clear them at any time.
The ten dimensions
Each with a few forms richness can take. There are others.
Career
Work that uses you well.
Whether the work you do fits the person you are becoming: the specialty, the setting, the pace and the direction it is heading.
What richness can look like
- A specialty you would choose again
- Work that is becoming more interesting, not less
- Real options, if you wanted to change
Questions to sit with
- If you could never be promoted again, would you still want this job?
- Which part of your working week would you keep if you could keep only one?
Read
Money
Enough, and knowing what enough is.
Not the size of an income but the room it gives you: security, choices, and freedom from money worries crowding your thinking.
What richness can look like
- Months of runway
- Debt you understand and are paying down
- Spending that matches what you value
Questions to sit with
- How many months could you manage if your income stopped tomorrow?
- What would you do differently if money were less of a worry?
Read
Time
Hours that are yours.
How much of your week you choose for yourself, and whether you have the attention left to use it.
What richness can look like
- Evenings you can protect
- A rota you can plan a life around
- Rest that is more than recovery
Questions to sit with
- When did you last have a day with nothing scheduled?
- What do you actually do with free time when it arrives?
Read
Health
A body and mind that can carry the work.
Sleep, movement, food, mental health, and the check-ups doctors are famously good at skipping.
What richness can look like
- Sleep you can rely on
- Movement you enjoy
- Someone you could talk to in a bad week
Questions to sit with
- What would you tell a patient who was living your week?
- When did you last see your own doctor?
Read
Relationships
People who know you beyond the title.
Partners, friends, family and colleagues, and whether medicine leaves room for them.
What richness can look like
- Friends outside medicine
- A partnership with room for two careers
- Time with family that is not squeezed in
Questions to sit with
- Who would you call on a hard day?
- Who have you been meaning to see for months?
Read
Location
Living where you want to live.
The city or country you live in, how you came to be there, and whether you could move if you wanted to.
What richness can look like
- A place you chose
- A commute you can live with
- Roots, or the freedom to move
Questions to sit with
- Did you choose where you live, or did training choose it for you?
- Where would you live if your work could come with you?
Read
Intellectual life
A mind that keeps growing.
Reading, learning and curiosity beyond what the next exam or appraisal requires.
What richness can look like
- Learning something nobody asked you to
- Conversations that change your mind
- A subject you follow for pleasure
Questions to sit with
- What have you learned recently that was not for work?
- What would you study if nobody would ever examine you on it?
Read
Creativity
Making something of your own.
Writing, music, cooking, building or design: anything you make for its own sake, at any level of skill.
What richness can look like
- A practice you return to
- Something you have made this year
- Permission to be a beginner
Questions to sit with
- What did you make as a child that you have stopped making?
- Where in your week could an hour of making fit?
Read
Business
Building something that lasts.
Owning, starting or growing something: a practice, a company, a service or a body of work. Not necessary for a rich life, but a real possibility in a medical one.
What richness can look like
- An idea you are quietly testing
- Skills that work beyond the clinic
- Ownership of what you build
Questions to sit with
- Is there something you would build if failing cost very little?
- Is building something a want, or a feeling that you should?
Read
Freedom
The ability to say no.
In a way, the sum of the others: how many of your choices are really yours, and what it would cost to change course.
What richness can look like
- Savings that buy time
- Skills that travel
- An identity that is not only your job
Questions to sit with
- What would you do if you knew you could change course safely?
- What is one thing you keep doing only because you always have?
Read
Your reflection
Ten parts of your life, four questions each.
Answer as honestly as you can, and skip anything you would rather not. There are no right answers and nothing is added up. Your answers are saved in this browser so you can come back to them.
Method
What this is, and what it is not
The RICH DOCTOR Index is an editorial framework, written by our editors to help doctors and medical students think about their lives. The ten dimensions reflect what we write about and what readers tell us matters. They are not drawn from a validated instrument, and the reflection is not a psychological, medical or financial assessment.
There is no scoring. Your answers are not added, weighted or compared with anyone else’s. The reflection groups dimensions using only what you said: those you said matter and want to change, those you want to protect, and those that feel unsettled but matter less right now. The words that follow are prompts and reading, not conclusions.
Your answers are stored only in this browser, using its local storage, so you can return to them. They are never sent to RICH DOCTOR. A shared link contains only what you choose to include, and never how a dimension feels or your notes. It is carried after the # in the address, which browsers do not send to the website.
If reflecting on any of this has been hard, or a dimension feels much more than unsettled, please talk to someone you trust or to a professional. In India, Tele-MANAS, the national tele-mental health helpline run by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, is free and open 24 hours a day on 14416 or 1800-891-4416. Source
The Handover
A richer life in medicine, every Sunday.
The Handover brings one considered letter a week about the whole of a medical life: career, money, time and the rest.