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“No Experience Needed,” “￦9-10 Million (even if you work) for 3 Days a Week (US$1=￦1325)”
This is a Seoul Cosmetic Dermatology Clinic’s recent job posting on a doctors-only website. The advertisement mentioned that even newly graduated medical doctors are eligible to apply, and if they work 5 days a week, they can earn up to ￦14 million (after tax).”
These days, in the medical field, such cosmetic dermatologists are often referred to as “MuCheonDoSa (무천도사).” This term is used to describe cosmetic dermatologists[”Sa,” meaning “specialist”] who may not be specialists, having no specialized major degree or experience [”Mu,” meaning “No”], yet earn more than ￦10 million per month after tax [”Cheon,” meaning “thousand”], and often work in urban areas [”Do,” meaning “urban”]. An analysis of job postings by over 140 dermatology clinics on the doctors-only internet community, MediGate, on the 4th, revealed that most of them offered a monthly salary of ￦11 million to 16 million (after tax) for working six days a week, including weekdays and Saturdays. A dermatology clinic in Bucheon, Gyeonggi-do, even posted that they would pay ￦700,000 (after tax) per day to “part-time doctors” who work for just a few days. Other hospitals clearly stated specific requirements for applicants such as “Internal Medicine Specialist” or “Orthopedic Specialist,” including experience and specialized training in a certain major. However, most of the job postings by cosmetic dermatology clinics stated “No experience or specialization required.” One cosmetic dermatology clinic in Seoul and Suwon even offered ￦13 million per month for general practitioners with no prior clinical experience but willing to work six days a week.
Around the same time, a hospital in Dongtan, Gyeonggi Province, posted a job opening for an Obstetrics and Gynecology specialist on the same community. They offered a monthly salary of 15 million to ￦15.5 million (after tax) for six days a week of work. This means that the monthly salary for a general practitioner in cosmetic dermatology who has just graduated from medical school is not significantly different from the monthly salary of an Obstetrics and Gynecology specialist who has studied for an additional 4 to 5 years. A director of a dermatology clinic in Seoul mentioned, “There is an increasing trend of doctors who obtain a general practitioner qualification, immediately work in cosmetic dermatology for a few years, and then open their own clinics.”
Dermatology clinics tend to concentrate in metropolitan areas because there is high demand for services like skin whitening and wrinkle improvement in major cities. According to the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service, out of the current 1,428 dermatology clinics in South Korea, 59 percent are located in Seoul and Gyeonggi Province. This high concentration in the metropolitan areas is higher compared to other medical departments like internal medicine (45 percent) and surgery (43 percent). The metropolitan areas with good living conditions are preferred working locations for doctors. In this situation, young doctors are increasingly drawn to cosmetic dermatology, where they can earn high incomes even without significant prior experience in major cities. In the first half of this year, looking at the recruitment results for specialized medical doctors, dermatology had 99 applicants for 66 positions, resulting in an application rate of 150 percent, which was among the highest along with ophthalmology (170 percent) and plastic surgery (157 percent). A professor at a comprehensive hospital in Seoul stated, “The term ‘MuCheonDoSa’ (mu-cheon-do-sa) mainly refers to dermatologists who exclusively practice in cosmetic dermatology. It should be distinguished from dermatologists who treat conditions like skin cancer or atopic dermatitis.”
On the other hand, essential medical fields like internal medicine, surgery, obstetrics and gynecology, and pediatrics are facing severe shortages of medical professionals during specialist recruitment. The main reason for this shortage is the demanding nature of the work in these fields combined with relatively lower incomes compared to cosmetic dermatology. South Korea’s first specialized children’s hospital, Seoul Soha Hospital, suspended Sunday and holiday outpatient services in June due to a lack of doctors. Gachon University Gil Hospital in the Incheon area suspended pediatric inpatient care for two months last December due to a shortage of specialists.
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