Some of the reasons fewer medical students are choosing to specialize in primary care — a subset of internal medicine — has to do with lifestyle, says a report in the Sept. 10 issue of JAMA, the Journal of the American Medical Association.
They want better hours and recompense for the amount of time and work it requires to treat the large portion of elderly and medically complex patients this specialty sees.
A study to find out students’ impressions and concerns found they were concerned about patient complexity, the practice environment and lifestyle, compared with other specialties, officials said.
“Current students recognize the increasing demands on internists, particularly primary care physicians, to accomplish large numbers of preventive and therapeutic interventions during short visits with chronically ill patients while also managing increasing administrative expectations,” the authors wrote. “Career interest in general (internal medicine) is particularly low, reflecting the challenges in the primary care practice environment…”