Career preference of undergraduate medical students and its underlying factors

Abstract

Objective: To explore the nature of career preferences (either general practice or speciality practice) in Malaysian undergraduate medical students and its underlying factors Methods: Total 210 1st year MBBS undergraduate medical students of the Universiti Sains Malaysia were invited to participate in this study. Data were collected by self-administered questionnaire and Focus Group Discussion (FGD). Chi-square, Mann-Whitney test and Multiple logistic regression were applied to find out the influencing factors of career choice. 210 students, 146 (70%) students responded in this study. Among the 146. Results: A total of respondents, 105 (71.9%) students preferred specialty practice (SP) and 20 (13.7%) preferred general practice (GP) as their future career. Medical life style and societal orientation were statistically significant predictors of career preferences. Student preferences general practice as their future career increased by about 8% and 7% for each additional medical life style and societal orientation score respectively. Students preferred general practice mainly due to its diversity, role model and life style option. Conclusion: Assessment of the societal orientation and medical life style factors of the candidates should be encompassed with the medical school admission policies for enhancing the number of GP. Medical schools should be encouraged to increase the number of GP teachers/academics involved in teaching their medical students. Health policy makers should be more concentrated on the life style factors to attract the medical students towards general practice by offering a superior work-life balance of GPS.