What Type of Doctor Should I Be?

As third year medical students, my classmates and I have passed the halfway point of our medical school careers and it is a good time for us to start thinking more about what we’d be interested in doing for our careers. Many of us probably entered medical school thinking we know exactly what we wanted to do. I certainly did. Some of us still hold onto those same aspirations, but many of us may have re-evaluated our original thoughts and broadened our considerations, especially as we become exposed more and more to the different fascinating medical specialties during our clinical portion of our training. Although I have learned a lot about what Psychiatry and Internal Medicine are about with my rotations in these specialties thus far, what I learned more about is myself.

Before coming to medical school, and even during Basic Sciences, I would not have even considered a field like psychiatry. But after experiencing working with patients in the ward for 10 weeks, I was quite surprised that I actually enjoyed it, and found it satisfying, and I wondered to myself why. Is it because I newly discovered how much behavior fascinates me? Is it because each patient has a unique story to tell and presents with a different challenge to solve? Will I feel the same way with all the other specialties that I rotate in? While our interests in certain topics may change, as it often does in life, some things will never change for me. I will always be interested in people, and love caring for people long term. I will always enjoy guiding others, and feel gratitude and honored in being a part of people’s lives. And for this reason, I will have to find a specialty that will not just satisfy my interest, but complement my nature.

While reading through some blogs of AUC grads, I came across a test created by University of Virginia School of Medicine that attempts to suggest which specialties of medicine you have the most aptitude for. The test makes you fill out a questionaire of 130 questions, and calculates based on personality and preferences which specialties in medicine would be most fit for you. I was skeptical about this test at first, but after seeing the results, I gotta admit, it is actually quite accurate, at least for me. Fields like family practice, psychiatry, pediatrics, and preventative medicine all really appeal to me, and all of them are ranked within the top ten in my test results (see chart below). Other specialties like surgery, orthopedics, Ob/Gyn are fields I think may be interesting but cannot foresee myself doing them for the rest of my life, and they happen to show up at the bottom of the list. However, I am surprised to see dermatology high on this list, as I’d imagine I might find it a little boring just looking at skin all day, and as for physical med and rehabilitation (PM&R), it’s something I’ve never thought about but perhaps I could look more into what it’s all about, and why they say I may be more fitting for it.

But no matter what any matchmaking calculator may tell me, what’s most important is finding out for myself a field that I would truly enjoy doing and feel fulfilled as a person doing it. We only have one life to live, and we’ll have to live it doing what we love. And now, as a clinical student, it is my job not only to put effort in the field I think I might want to pursue, but to be open and put effort in every field I come across, so that I have utmost understanding of what’s best for my future.

Here are my results! If you’re interested in seeing what specialty you may be fit for, please check out UVA’s Medical Specialty Aptitude Test here.

Rank	Specialty	Score
1	family practice	48
2	pediatrics	48
3	med oncology	47
4	dermatology	46
5	physical med & rehabilitation	46
6	psychiatry	46
7	general internal med	45
8	rheumatology	45
9	preventive med	44
10	occupational med	44
11	radiology	43
12	radiation oncology	43
13	nephrology	42
14	hematology	42
15	allergy & immunology	41
16	anesthesiology	40
17	endocrinology	40
18	pathology	40
19	colon & rectal surgery	39
20	gastroenterology	39
21	infectious disease	38
22	neurology	38
23	neurosurgery	37
24	aerospace med	37
25	nuclear med	37
26	pulmonology	37
27	emergency med	37
28	plastic surgery	36
29	thoracic surgery	35
30	obstetrics/gynecology	35
31	ophthalmology	34
32	cardiology	34
33	orthopaedic surgery	33
34	otolaryngology	31
35	urology	31
36	general surgery	30

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