Attitudes of Pakistani Medical Students Towards Psychiatry as a Prospective Career: A Survey

Syed, Ehsan Ullah; Siddiqi, M; Dogar, Imtiaz Ahmad; Hamrani, Mohammad Munir; Yousafzai, Abdul Wahab; Zuberi, Saman I

doi:10.1176/appi.ap.32.2.160

Cited by 27 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…Estimates of the percentage of students who consider psychiatry as a career option but have not made a definite decision vary by country and methodology, for example 9% in the UK [44], 7.6% in Pakistan [45] and 33% in Israel [46]. Our combined finding was 15%, with geographical variation ranging from 0-33%, and thus broadly in line with previous results.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 89%

Why medical students choose psychiatry - a 20 country cross-sectional survey

Lydall²,

et al. 2014

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BackgroundRecruitment to psychiatry is insufficient to meet projected mental health service needs world-wide. We report on the career plans of final year medical students from 20 countries, investigating factors identified from the literature which influence psychiatric career choice.MethodsCross sectional electronic or paper survey. Subjects were final year medical students at 46 medical schools in participating countries. We assessed students’ career intentions, motivations, medical school teaching and exposure to psychiatry. We assessed students’ attitudes and personality factors. The main outcome measure was likelihood of specializing in psychiatry. Multilevel logistic regression was used to examine the joint effect of factors upon the main outcome.Results2198 of 9135 (24%) of students responded (range 4 to 91%) across the countries. Internationally 4.5% of students definitely considered psychiatry as a career (range 1 to 12%). 19% of students (range 0 to 33%) were “quite likely”, and 25% were “definitely not” considering psychiatry. Female gender, experience of mental/physical illness, media portrayal of doctors, and positive attitudes to psychiatry, but not personality factors, were associated with choosing psychiatry. Quality of psychiatric placement (correlation coefficient = 0.22, p < 0.001) and number of placements (correlation coefficient =0.21, p < 0.001) were associated with higher ATP scores. During medical school, experience of psychiatric enrichment activities (special studies modules and university psychiatry clubs), experience of acutely unwell patients and perceived clinical responsibility were all associated with choice of psychiatry.Multilevel logistic regression revealed six factors associated with students choosing psychiatry: importance of own vocation, odds ratio (OR) 3.01, 95% CI 1.61 to 5.91, p < 0.001); interest in psychiatry before medical school, OR 10.8 (5.38 to 21.8, p < 0.001); undertaking a psychiatry special study module, OR 1.45 (1.05 to 2.01, p = 0.03) or elective OR 4.28 (2.87- 6.38, p < 0.001); membership of a university psychiatry club, OR 3.25 (2.87 to 6.38, p < 0.001); and exposure to didactic teaching, OR 0.54 (0.40 to 0.72, p < 0.001).ConclusionsWe report factors relevant to medical student selection and psychiatry teaching which affect career choice. Addressing these factors may improve recruitment to psychiatry internationally.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 89%

Why medical students choose psychiatry - a 20 country cross-sectional survey

Lydall²,

et al. 2014

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“…While enrolled medical students in the United States find the field intellectually interesting (Cutler et al 2006), many regard clinical work with psychiatric patients as unappealing (Galka et al 2005;Martin et al 2005;Singh et al 1998;Balon et al 1999;Sierles et al 1995;Nielsen et al 1981) and even stressful (Cutler et al 2006). Similar observations have been made in many countries around the world (Brockington and Mumford 2002;Malhi et al 2002;Fischel et al 2008;Ndetei et al 2008;Syed et al 2008;Ay et al 2006).…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 84%

Discrediting the notion “working with ‘crazies’ will make you ‘crazy’”: addressing stigma and enhancing empathy in medical student education

Cutler

Harding

Mozian

et al. 2008

Adv in Health Sci Educ

111

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People with mental illness around the world continue to suffer from stigmatization and limited care. Previous studies utilizing self-report questionnaires indicate that many medical students regard clinical work with psychiatric patients as unappealing, while the professionalism literature has documented a general decline in students' capacity for empathy over the course of medical school. Through in-depth interviews, this study attempts to better understand the formation of medical students' perceptions of psychiatry and the implications of that process for a more general understanding of the impact of emotionally-laden experiences on medical students' capacity for empathy. Forty-seven fourth-year medical students who had expressed interest or performed well in psychiatry were asked a series of questions to elicit their perceptions of the field of psychiatry. Interview transcripts were systematically coded using content analysis and principles of grounded theory. Stigma, stereotypes, and stressfully intense emotional reactions seemed to adversely affect the students' expected satisfaction from and willingness to care for the mentally ill, despite enjoying psychiatry's intellectual content and the opportunity to develop in-depth relationships with patients. Teaching faculty need to directly address the stigma and stereotypes that surround mental illness and actively help medical students cope with the stress that they report experiencing during their psychiatry clerkship in order to improve the recognition and treatment of psychiatric illness by newly graduating physicians. More generally, the relationships that we identify among stress, stigmatization, and stereotyping along an empathic spectrum suggest that increased attention should be paid to the stress that empathy can entail. This perspective may allow for the creation of similarly targeted interventions throughout the medical school curriculum to counteract the decline in empathy, the so-called "hardening of the heart," associated with physician-training worldwide.

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“…The students noted that it was interesting to try to unravel the cause of a psychiatric illness, and that psychiatric hospitals have a specifi c contribution to make to the treatment of the mentally ill. The practice of psychiatry allowed the development of really rewarding relationships with people (Syed et al, 2008;Wigney & Parker, 2008).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some studies have also reported positive attributes including an attractive work -life balance, interesting subject matter, and an intellectually challenging fi eld (Syed et al, 2008;Wigney & Parker, 2008).…”

Section: Background Information and Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Factors that influence the choice of psychiatry as a career by medical students at the School of Medicine, College of Health Sciences, University of Nairobi

Ndetei

Ngumi

Mutiso

et al. 2013

International Review of Psychiatry

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The aim of this paper is to assess the particular factors facilitating and those hampering the choice of psychiatry as a career by medical students at the University of Nairobi in a cross-sectional population study of medical students at the University of Nairobi, College of Health Sciences, School of Medicine using self-administered questionnaires. A total of 31 students (13%) said they would like to be psychiatrists while 44 (18%) were neutral and 170 (69%) did not want to become psychiatrists. The factors that made psychiatry interesting for the students included the view that the problems presented by psychiatric patients were often particularly interesting and challenging and the fact that mental illness presented the field of medicine with one of the greatest challenges. Discouraging factors articulated by the students included views that psychiatry was a vague and speculative speciality, psychiatry was not an important part of the curriculum in medical schools, and psychiatric patients tend to make more emotional demands on their doctors than other patients. There was a negative view of psychiatric patients who most of the students thought were strange, dangerous and incurable, although they were curious to know more about them. Most of the negative influence in psychiatry is due to the misconceptions that students have about its prestige and scope, the rewards it offers in terms of job satisfaction and opportunities and the negative views towards psychiatric patients. Integration of psychiatry into the curriculum may address these misunderstandings.

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Attitudes of Pakistani Medical Students Towards Psychiatry as a Prospective Career: A Survey

Abstract: Relatively small numbers of students identified psychiatry as their specialty of choice. This trend is similar to many other studies. Given the small number of practicing psychiatrists in Pakistan, this finding is not very encouraging.

Cited by 27 publications

References 14 publications

Why medical students choose psychiatry - a 20 country cross-sectional survey

Why medical students choose psychiatry - a 20 country cross-sectional survey

Discrediting the notion “working with ‘crazies’ will make you ‘crazy’”: addressing stigma and enhancing empathy in medical student education

Factors that influence the choice of psychiatry as a career by medical students at the School of Medicine, College of Health Sciences, University of Nairobi

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