Dataset Information

Workshop with medical students on physicians' earning opportunities, workload and job satisfaction increases the attractiveness of working self-employed and working in general practice.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Among the various factors identified as relevant for primary care career choice, financial considerations have been consistently shown to have an impact. In Germany, reliable and easily understandable information on physicians' earning opportunities in self-employed settings is difficult to obtain for medical students, leading to substantial misperceptions that may negatively affect respective career considerations. This study investigated medical students' evaluation of a 45-min evidence-based workshop on earning opportunities, workload and job satisfaction in different specialties and settings to examine its effect on the perceived attractiveness of working self-employed and working in general practice.

Methods

The workshop was implemented as part of a mandatory general practice clerkship in the fourth study year (of six). Post-hoc evaluations of all participants between October 2017 and September 2018 (one cohort) were analysed cross-sectionally including descriptive statistics, subgroup comparisons and qualitative analysis of free-text answers regarding students' main insights.

Results

Response rate was 98.1% (307/313). Participants were on average 25.0 years old, and 68.3% were women. Based on a ten-point scale ranging from 1 = 'no influence' to 10 = 'very big influence', 91.9% confirmed at least some (> = 2) and 57.3% a rather high (> = 5) influence of earning expectations on their career choice process. Regarding the workshop, 86.1% were overall satisfied, and 89.5% indicated they had gained new insights, primarily regarding earning opportunities in different specialties and work settings, and frequently regarding job satisfaction, workload and the structure of revenues and expenditures in a doctor's office (according to qualitative analysis). In the opinion of 89.8% of students, the provided learning content should be part of the undergraduate curriculum. More than half of participants reported an increase regarding the attractiveness of working self-employed and working as a general practitioner, most frequently regarding earning opportunities, but also in general and in respect to job satisfaction, cost-benefit ratio and workload. This increase was significantly higher among students favouring or at least considering a general practice career.

Conclusions

The workshop and its content were appreciated by the students and showed clear potential to usefully complement undergraduate curricula aiming at increasing or reinforcing students' interest in working self-employed and working in general practice.

SUBMITTER: Heine A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8887135 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Workshop with medical students on physicians' earning opportunities, workload and job satisfaction increases the attractiveness of working self-employed and working in general practice.

Heine Alexander A Geier Anne-Kathrin AK Lippmann Stefan S Bleckwenn Markus M Frese Thomas T Deutsch Tobias T

BMC medical education 20220301 1

<h4>Background</h4>Among the various factors identified as relevant for primary care career choice, financial considerations have been consistently shown to have an impact. In Germany, reliable and easily understandable information on physicians' earning opportunities in self-employed settings is difficult to obtain for medical students, leading to substantial misperceptions that may negatively affect respective career considerations. This study investigated medical students' evaluation of a 45- ...[more]

PMID: 35232434

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Project description:BackgroundSeveral studies report a substantial impact of financial considerations on the process of specialty choice and the willingness to establish one's own practice. In Germany, reliable information on self-employed physicians' earning opportunities is basically available, but not easily accessible and understandable for medical students. Misperceptions might contribute to recruitment problems in some fields, particularly in general practice. In order to identify a possible need for action, we investigated current German medical students' level of information regarding future earnings, and whether net earnings of general practitioners and other physicians working self-employed are estimated realistically. Additionally, we explored students' self-assessments regarding the extent of the impact of expected earnings on their personal career choice process.MethodsWe conducted a cross-sectional questionnaire survey among fourth year (of six) medical students at one medical school (Leipzig). The participants estimated the net earnings of different physicians working self-employed. These estimations were compared with actual earnings data derived from a large German practice panel.ResultsResponse rate was 73.6% (231/314). The participants' mean age was 24.9 years and 59.1% were women. On a 10-point scale ranging from 1 = 'no influence' to 10='very big influence', 92.6% of the participants described at least some (≥2) influence of earning expectations on their career choice process, and 66.2% stated this influence to be 5 or higher. Every fourth student (26.4%) would rather or definitely reject a certain specialty because of expected low earning opportunities. While 60.4% had already thought about future earnings, only 26.8% had obtained concrete information. Compared with the data derived from the practice panel, the participants substantially underestimated the earning opportunities in self-employed settings, including general practice (median: 4500 vs. 6417€). However, depending on the single estimations, between 87.7 and 95.6% of the students stated they were 'rather uncertain' or 'very uncertain' regarding their estimations.ConclusionsDespite confirming a relevant impact of financial considerations on career choice, German fourth year medical students are not well informed about earning opportunities in self-employed settings. Providing easily understandable information could enhance transparency and might help students to consider financial issues of career choice on a realistic basis.

Project description:ObjectiveThe aim of this study was to evaluate the impact of several employment-related aspects on overall job satisfaction among pharmacists working in Saudi pharmacy settings.MethodsA cross-sectional survey was conducted for a period of 1-month (December 2020) among pharmacists working in community pharmacies located in 3 cities of Saudi Arabia. Convenience sampling was employed, and the data was collected using the English version of Job Satisfaction Survey (JSS) questionnaire. The data was analyzed using IBM SPSS version 23. Descriptive statistics such as mean ([Formula: see text]) and 95% confidence interval range were used to report continuous data; frequency (%) and sample counts (N) were used to report categorical data. Bivariate analyses were conducted using chi square (χ2) test. A multiple linear regression model was formulated to report the employment aspects that determined overall job satisfaction of pharmacists. The study was approved by an ethics committee.ResultsA total of 241 samples were analyzed. Less than a quarter of pharmacists (N = 54, 22.4%) were satisfied with their job. The overall job satisfaction score was 130.74 out of 199. The sub-scales for co-workers and communication had scores > 15.8 out of 24; subscale for operating conditions had score > 12.5 out of 20. The subscales for promotion and rewards had scores < 14 out of 24. The aspects of communication, fringe benefits and nature of work had the highest contribution towards overall job satisfaction. For a unit increase in score for communication, fringe benefits, and nature of work, the overall job satisfaction score increased by 0.204, 0.2, and 0.199, respectively.ConclusionA very small number of pharmacists seemed satisfied with their job. Satisfaction with communication, nature of work and fringe benefits contributed the most toward overall job satisfaction. Results of this study could provide the means for human resource managers and organizational policy makers to delve into the determinants of satisfaction among pharmacists working in community settings.

Dataset Information

Workshop with medical students on physicians' earning opportunities, workload and job satisfaction increases the attractiveness of working self-employed and working in general practice.

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusions

Publications

Workshop with medical students on physicians' earning opportunities, workload and job satisfaction increases the attractiveness of working self-employed and working in general practice.

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