Frustration about choosing a specialty

[bananarama123]

It might be burnout, but I'm starting to get a bit frustrated by my rotations. I'm still undecided on a field right now and whenever I start to get interested in something I end up getting bored pretty fast. A lot of the path/diseases that draw me to those fields don't come up very often, maybe 5% of cases. The other 95% is bread-and-butter (which is cool too, but gets repetitive.. I can only do so many CHF f/u appts). I enjoy the OR a bit more because even the bread-and-butter cases have subtle anatomical differences that make the case interesting, but I never really thought of myself as a hardcore surgery person. Don't get me wrong; I love medicine and in no way am I thinking of ditching the field. I still love to go to work everyday, but I wonder if every field is like this in one way or another and I should just accept it, or if I should keep checking out other fields till I find one that keeps me interested 100% of the time. Anyone else feel like this?

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[duckie99]

Everything becomes routine after a certain point. I agree it is very difficult with the limited knowledge we have as students to get a full perspective on any one field of medicine.

What I did was look at my long term goals and where I wanted to fall in the treatment of a patient. I did not want to be in the background (path or rads), did not want to deal with kids or pregnant women (peds and ob/gyn and FM), like procedures but not surgery (no surgical fields), want to be somewhat specialized (not EM), like a more long term care to a patient (not anesthesia, derm, EM, etc), don't like all that psych entails (though I do like treating certain conditions like depression), like various aspects of physiology like heart and lungs, and like talking to patients and dealing with lots of issues. As a result I chose IM and will very likely specialize (not completely decided at this point as to what). For me it wasn't a very cut and dry decision but a gut feeling I got when I finally said "ok I'll do IM".

Some people go about the process differently. For example, they like the OR so it's a no brainer - surgery. They want to deal with cancer but not surgery - rad onc or heme/onc. Like kids - peds. Like delivering babies - obgyn. Like imaging and being in the background - rads... I could go on.

But I don't know... I like seeing CHF. I like heart physiology and even things that seem as routine as CHF usually involves more than just "ok let's get this guy on his meds". But hey everyone is different. Personally I found surgery beyond boring and tedious. To me if you like the intricacies of anatomy and the OR you sound like a person who fits nicely into a surgical field. Just explore which surgical procedures seem the most interesting to you.

 

[DreamingTheLive]

Duckie99 makes some good points. I went through this myself during 3rd year, took me until an April/May rotation to decide definitively, although once I did the first day of the rotation there was no doubt.

I think its important to think about not only the pathology, patients, nuances of the field, but also about the interplay between prospective fields of medicine and your personal life going forward. What kind of a person are you? Morning? Night? Shift worker? Set your own schedule? Workaholic? Weekends off? Odd hours? Is this your life's work or just a job? Family? Kids?....how might these things change 5, 10 and 20 years from now. Obviously nobody can predict the future, but knowing yourself well will lend you a lot of perspective and insight towards what fields will ultimately be the best "fit."

I LOVE the field I'm going into, but there are still negatives, no question, and I imagine this is for any field. But for me the negatives were small and I felt they could be dealt with or minimized under certain circumstances.

 

[p30doc]

Have you considered anesthesia? Procedures, instant gratification of seeing your interventions at work or failing, OR work environment. No clinic, no follow up, no rounding, no dictating, no social issues, better quality of life than a surgeon.

 

[Stellar Clouds]

Have you considered anesthesia? Procedures, instant gratification of seeing your interventions at work or failing, OR work environment. No clinic, no follow up, no rounding, no dictating, no social issues, better quality of life than a surgeon.

+1,000,000

You beat me to saying the exact same thing.

 

[Top Gun]

To the OP:

It sounds like surgery or anesthesia might be your cup of tea. I would consider one of those fields.

 

[DreamingTheLive]

Anesthesia is a good gig, no doubt, it would have probably been my 2nd or 3rd choice were I not to have chosen another field.

But don't forget to give some serious introspection to what you want from your life 10, 20 and 30 years from now. Don't get lost amongst the trees.

 

[Gfliptastic]

I still feel like it's the journey and not the destination. And I mean I luv the PATIENTS, not just what's wrong w/ them. That's my perspective, but it also is tough to make a decision based on that too.

I did my FM rotation. Yeah, there's only so many acute sinusitis/URI, DBM, HTN people you can see, but they were ALL individuals w/ their own unique stories. Or in PEDS. Yes, every 6 month old baby, every 3 year old kid is there for the SAME wellness and vaccinations. But each kid is colorfully different.

I'm on call for OB. We induced 2 women earlier tonite. Ya know, the end result is delivering their baby. But these women are so unique, you ask the same question, "How ya feelin right now?" and they give me 2 different responses. We had 2 c-sections yesterday. One woman looked and acted like she was ready to go home when we rounded on her this AM. The other sez she felt like she got hit by a cement truck and was miserable.

All healthy people are healthy. All sick people are sick. That is a big durrrr, but also a hugely true generalization if you are going to break down medicine into that. Your perspective makes it repetitive. The patients make each encounter unique!

 

[alpinism]

If Gas, you'd prob want to do CC as well.

Sounds like you want a field w a large variety of challenging pathology. GS, IM ( then ID/CC/Onco), or Gas (then CC) at a large tertiary care center in a major city might fit.

 

[WildWing]

SDN just launched a new feature called "How to Choose a Medical Specialty" (based on the book by Anita Taylor) that includes a quiz to help you see what specialties might be the best fit for you based on what is important to you and your personality:
http://www.studentdoctor.net/schools/selector

It's free for SDN members and includes overviews of all the specialties and the IM sub-specialties.

Also, five copies of the new (fifth) edition of the book are also being raffled off as part of Test Prep Week:
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=983831

There aren't many entries at this point, so it is worth checking out since your chances of winning are good!

 

[username456789]

SDN just launched a new feature called "How to Choose a Medical Specialty" (based on the book by Anita Taylor) that includes a quiz to help you see what specialties might be the best fit for you based on what is important to you and your personality:
http://www.studentdoctor.net/schools/selector

It's free for SDN members and includes overviews of all the specialties and the IM sub-specialties.
!

Not bad.

My top 5 were:

1. Radiology - Diagnostic - 77%
2. Internal Medicine - Gastroenterology - 76%
3. Urology - 76%
4. Dermatology - 74%
5. Ophthalmology - 73%

All things I seriously considered at one point or another.