If you are a beginner and you are only used to MED then you should not switch to one of the complicated modelers out there. Maya is very expensive and complex. You can learn with free software like Blender or Truespace much more. You get enough tutorials. There are even fantastic books about modeling, animating and rendering in Blender.

Better go step by step.

And then, if you know what you need and what you miss you have a better inside to judge the commercial tools. I can assure you, there are better and cheaper ones compared to Maya, offering better uv-tools, sculpting and 3d-painting.