Dataset Information

Lifestyle Factors and Other Influences on Medical Students Choosing a Career in Emergency Medicine.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

The purpose of this study was to determine which lifestyle factors influence medical students who choose a career in emergency medicine (EM).

Methods

Final-year medical students from 10 medical schools were surveyed after the National Residency Match Program match but prior to graduation regarding preferred medical specialty and lifestyle preferences. Responses from students pursuing EM regarding importance of lifestyle factors were compared to students interested in other specialties.

Results

A total of 453 of 1,575 invited medical students completed an electronic survey. EM was the third most preferred specialty. Students selecting EM were less likely to endorse "having control of work schedule" as being important (p < 0.005), but more likely to endorse "having time off work" as important (p < 0.05). When students were asked what specific factors were important in choosing a specialty, EM students differed from other students in the importance of flexible work schedule, time outside of work, and balance between work and personal life (p < 0.001). Fewer EM students endorsed that having a "low-stress work day" was an important consideration in their specialty choice (p < 0.001).

Conclusions

In this study representing 10 medical schools, graduating medical students who prefer EM as opposed to other specialties exhibit differences in lifestyle factors deemed important when choosing a specialty as a physician. Further investigation regarding any potential link to these factors and career longevity is warranted.

SUBMITTER: Keith KC

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7821054 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Lifestyle Factors and Other Influences on Medical Students Choosing a Career in Emergency Medicine.

Keith Kevin C KC Smith Elizabeth E Reddy Shalini S Bourne Christina L CL

AEM education and training 20200312 1

<h4>Objective</h4>The purpose of this study was to determine which lifestyle factors influence medical students who choose a career in emergency medicine (EM).<h4>Methods</h4>Final-year medical students from 10 medical schools were surveyed after the National Residency Match Program match but prior to graduation regarding preferred medical specialty and lifestyle preferences. Responses from students pursuing EM regarding importance of lifestyle factors were compared to students interested in oth ...[more]

PMID: 33521489

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Project description:BackgroundThe COVID-19 pandemic added new and great uncertainty to the typical approach to applying into emergency medicine (EM) for medical students. There are little data on students' lived experience of applying during this time period. We performed a multi-institutional survey of EM-bound students' experiences with preparing to apply into EM during the pandemic.MethodsThis was a cross-sectional survey design study of fourth-year students preparing to apply into EM during the 2020-2021 academic year. All self-identified EM-bound students at four participating institutions were recruited by email in June 2020 to participate in a 13-item, 5-point Likert-scale survey. Univariate descriptive statistics, response rate, and nonresponse bias were calculated.ResultsSixty-seven of 125 eligible students responded for an overall response rate of 53.6%. Nonresponse bias for specific survey items ranged from 0.01 to 0.12. Students rated the importance of securing an EM rotation at their home institution the highest of any item (mean ± SD = 4.81 ± 0.68). Students indicated higher satisfaction with advice from their department of EM (mean ± SD = 4.28 ± 0.75) than from their school of medicine (mean ± SD = 3.52 ± 0.89). Students indicated higher confidence in their home EM rotations' ability to assure adequate personal protective equipment (PPE; mean ± SD = 3.91 ± 0.83) than an away rotation (mean ± SD = 2.82, 1.09). Students reported feeling between moderately and quite stressed about applying into EM this year (mean ± SD = 3.49 ± 1.01), but reported the financial stress the lowest of any item (mean ± SD = 1.46 ± 0.84). Students rated it highly important that away rotations prioritize students from institutions without an EM residency (mean ± SD = 4.51 ± 0.93).ConclusionMedical students applying into EM during the COVID-19 pandemic felt confident in their EM advisors' recommendations and their home institution's PPE provision. Students with EM residency programs at their schools recognized the importance of away rotations being prioritized for students from schools without EM residency programs. Strong EM advising is important to students.

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Project description:ObjectivesIn 2016, a national consensus conference created the National Clinical Assessment Tool for Medical Students in Emergency Medicine (NCAT-EM), a standardized end-of-shift assessment tool. We report the first large-scale analysis of professionalism concerns collected from May 2017 through December 2018 by a multisite consortium using the NCAT-EM. Our primary objective was to characterize the nature and frequency of professionalism concerns. Our secondary objective was to identify characteristics associated with giving or receiving a professionalism flag.MethodsThe consortium database includes assessments for all students on EM clerkships at participating sites. This report presents descriptive statistics about the frequency of different flags, the distribution of flags among different student categories, assessor and student characteristics, and distribution of global assessment scores on assessments citing concerns. We used Fisher's exact test to look for associations between the frequency of professionalism flags and the sex of the students and assessors and across student categories. We used logistic regression to look for relationships between professionalism concerns and global assessment scores as well as intent to apply in EM.ResultsWe screened 6,768 assessments of 784 students by 719 assessors from 13 sites. After excluding assessments without flags and assessments with apparent data entry errors, we analyzed 57 (0.8%) assessments containing 79 flags. The most frequent flags were punctuality (25/79, 31.6%) and initiative (20/79, 25.3%). Few students received flags (42/784, 5.4%). Few assessors flagged concerns (41/719, 5.7%). We detected no correlation between the frequency of flags and whether a student was applying in EM or between the sex of students and assessors. Global scores of lower one-third appeared more often in assessments with a flag (30/57, 52.6% vs. 233/6,711, 3.5%).ConclusionsOnly 5.4% of students received flags. Punctuality and initiative accounted for a majority of citations. Professionalism flags correlated strongly with lower global assessment scores.

Dataset Information

Lifestyle Factors and Other Influences on Medical Students Choosing a Career in Emergency Medicine.

Objective

Methods

Results

Conclusions

Publications

Lifestyle Factors and Other Influences on Medical Students Choosing a Career in Emergency Medicine.

Similar Datasets

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