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Abstract
Background: A specialties’ lifestyle is known to be important for specialty selection, but how medical students define this concept is unknown. Purpose: The aim of this article is to determine how 4th-year medical students perceive lifestyle of specialties. Methods: All 4th-year U.S. medical students graduating in 2009 with a military service obligation were invited to participate in an electronic survey. Responses to an open-ended question, “When someone says ‘That specialty has a good lifestyle,’ what does that mean to you?” were classified into themes by a consensus of the authors and then compared to the students’ selected specialty. Results: Response rate for the questionnaire was 46% (369 of 797). Four themes describing lifestyle emerged: “schedule control” (67% of students), “off time” (53%), “financial aspects” (48%), and “work life” (26%). Conclusions: Medical students’ definition of a “good lifestyle” includes four themes, which should be used in future research of the lifestyle factor of specialty selection.
Acknowledgments
This article is not subject to US copyright law.
The opinions in this article are those of the authors and do not represent the official policy of the U.S. Government, the Department of Defense, or any unit within the Department of Defense. None of the authors have any conflicts of interest to disclose.