ArticleJournal of the Royal Society of Medicine2015
Factors influencing junior doctors' choices of future specialty: trends over time and demographics based on results from UK national surveys.
Article in Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 50 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
50 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 112 citations in OpenAlex.
- Development of a career questionnaire for medical undergraduates using Mokken scale analysis.BMC medical education · 2022Pooled it
- Factors influencing subspecialty choice among medical students: a systematic review and meta-analysis.BMJ open · 2019Pooled it
- Barriers and enablers to medical students' engagement in research and clinical academic careers: a mixed-methods study.BMJ open · 2025Article
- Medical student perceptions and career intentions toward neurosurgery: results from an international multicentre study.Neurosurgical review · 2025Article
- Motivational factors influencing the choice of oncology as a specialty among French medical students.BMC medical education · 2025Article
- Developing the intention to pursue a general practice career: a longitudinal survey study from medical school graduation into postgraduate medical training.BMC medical education · 2025Article
- Exploring Undergraduate Medical Students' Perceptions and Career Choices in Obstetrics and Gynecology.Geburtshilfe und Frauenheilkunde · 2025Article
- Early-career general practitioners' career intentions in Estonia: A qualitative study.The European journal of general practice · 2024Article
- Specialty choices among new generation of doctors - insights from a Polish survey study.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Experiences as a clinical teaching fellow: interviews with clinical teaching fellows in the West Midlands.BMC medical education · 2024Article
- Article
- Barriers to Choosing Pediatrics as a Specialty: Insights From a Cross-Sectional Analysis.Journal of Korean medical science · 2024Article
- Insights from end-of-career general practitioners on changing working conditions and generational differences: considerations for future strategies.BMC primary care · 2024Article
- Emergency physician personnel crisis: a survey on attitudes of new generations in Slovenia.BMC emergency medicine · 2024Article
- Perceived barriers to a career in pain medicine in the Republic of Ireland.Irish journal of medical science · 2024Article
- Assessing depression, anxiety, stress, and occupational decision regret levels among resident physicians working at Ankara University Faculty of Medicine Hospital.Turkish journal of medical sciences · 2024Article
- Article
- VENUM (Vascular Education iN Undergraduate Medicine): a multicentre evaluation of undergraduate vascular education in the UK.Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England · 2023Article
- Matching of advanced undergraduate medical students' competence profiles with the required competence profiles of their specialty of choice for postgraduate training.BMC medical education · 2023Article
- Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveTo study trends in factors influencing junior doctors' choice of future specialty.
designRespondents were asked whether each of 15 factors had a great deal of influence on their career choice, a little influence or no influence on it. Percentages are reported of those who specified that a factor had a great deal of influence on their career choice.
settingUK.
participantsA total of 15,765 UK-trained doctors who graduated between 1999 and 2012.
main outcome measuresQuestions about career choices and factors which may have influenced those choices, in particular comparing doctors who qualified in 2008-2012 with those who qualified in 1999-2002.
resultsEnthusiasm for and commitment to the specialty was a greater influence on career choice in the 2008-2012 qualifiers (81%) than those of 1999-2002 (64%), as was consideration of their domestic circumstances (43% compared with 20%). Prospects for promotion were less important to recent cohorts (16%) than older cohorts (21%), as were financial prospects (respectively, 10% and 14%). Domestic circumstances and working hours were considered more important, and financial prospects less important, by women than men. Inclination before medical school was rated as important by 41% of doctors who were over 30 years old, compared with 13% of doctors who were under 21, at the time of starting medical school.
conclusionsThe increasing importance of both domestic circumstances and enthusiasm for their specialty choice in recent cohorts suggest that today's young doctors prize both work-life balance and personal fulfilment at work more highly than did their predecessors. The differences in motivations of older and younger generations of doctors, men and women, and doctors who start medical school relatively late are worthy of note.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.