couple of things came to mind in hearing your question...
First of all, I'm slightly suspicious that you might be flaming here just to get a rise out of psychiatrists, but I will give you the benefit of the doubt.
Some thoughts:
You are not going to get an unbiased answer on how everyone in medicine views psychiatry by asking in the psychiatry forum. You are going to get psychiatrists who are defensive and obviously pro-psychiatry. Might want to consider asking the same question to the general residency forum.
It still is true that in general, psychiatry is one of the least competitive fields to match into. This is very different than what the competition is like to match into the higher tier programs in psychiatry. It is extremely difficult, for example to be selected as one of the 10 people to train at Columbia every year. There are people who were accepted at Harvard for Medicine who were rejected for psychiatry at NYU (who applied to both), so don't think that any old schmuck gets to be working at the good psychiatry residencies. (please excuse the name-dropping) And for that matter, many very smart and interesting people go into community psych programs just because they value the population seen at that program, or the culture, or the city, or whatever. But if we generalize, yes, it is pretty easy to get a spot somewhere in psychiatry which cannot be said for some of the more competitive fields in medicine.
Thus the students that are matching into psychiatry are a mixed bag and there certainly are those that are not compatible with other fields for personality or other eclectic reasons. Those people are often outcasts in medicine and contribute to a conception that psychiatry is the bottom of the barrel. Over the past number of years, however, psychiatry has become much more competitive because there are numerous effective and interesting treatment options, mental illness is less stigmatized, the lifestyle of the field is highly valued, the research is amazingly interesting (and thought of as the final frontier of medicine), and the field is becoming better understood.
Thus, you get the feeling that the thing that will continue to legitamize the field is when more and more medical grads see their bright and interesting and very academically competent colleagues choose psychiatry. This will breed a generation of doctors who all value psychiatry as opposed to it being such a mixed bag. But lets not dismiss the reality that depending on what doctor your psychology teacher talked to, she may very well have been told this. The fact that she felt compelled to regurgitate that information, even when it has no bearing on her life probably says something about her own issues accepting psychiatry.
The legitimacy of the field among other clinicians is very apparent to me, and anyone who works in a hospital knows the enormous value other doctors put on "psych consults", because they seem to dominate the clinical picture of many medically complicated patients that just can't be helped until their psychiatrically stabilized. Even doctors who have contempt for psychiatry (and they do exist) will be desperate for your help in the hospital and totally appreciative of it when you help them. In addition, I do think that psychiatry is almost universally thought of as an intellectual field, where psychiatrists are thought of as well-versed in areas of philosophy, ethics, sociology, Freud, Woody Allen movies, etc (even when we are not).
Medicine is a field of stereotyping, and all the type A gunners in it are impressed by name value, prestige, and being viewed as a success by others. Thus, there is the stereotype that some fields are hard to get into, thus anybody who gets into them gets the benefit of the doubt of being highly regarded academically (like derm or plastics), while other folks who choose "easier" fields, may be generalized as not high achievers.
A layperson might be surprised to hear that there are large contingents of doctors who stereotype surgeons and consider them some of the worst doctors and the least respected and intelligent people in medicine. This is clearly ridiculous to generalize this way, but you could make anecdotal arguments that there are a lot of times when surgeons don't know how to take care of patients. There are other folks who look down upon ER docs, calling them "glorified triage nurses" who don't think and only use algorhythms. So its easy, if you are of that constitution to get caught up in that game. And the reality is that many of us who choose psychiatry at some point have to confront some issues from family/colleagues/professors who have their own preconcieved notion of who goes into psychiatry. It is not an insignificant point in choosing ones career.
I think in clinical psych, you probably deal with that type of issue less, because you all signed up from day one to treat the mentally ill. But in medicine, less than 10 percent sign up to do that, and a fair amount want nothing to do with the mentally ill. Thus, I could have been a radiologist or heart surgeon or whatever I wanted, and I looked everybody in the eye and told them that I WANTED to work with the mentally ill for my whole life.
Many of them look at you back and think, "but you could sit in an office for 8 hours a day looking at films and never take call and make $500,000 per year. What would compell you to make $150,000 per year, be around patients who rely on you so heavily emotionally, have to confront your own psychological profile (which is horrifying for many doctors), and have to learn all these extra psychological treatment modalities and concepts that we don't get taught in med school?"
Actually, don't be surprised if you go to med school and the allure of making $500,000 per year doesn't make you consider being an ENT surgeon or something other than psych or peds.
The key is, "who cares" what others think. If you love psychiatry, you love psychiatry. I don't blame you, I love it and feel so gratified every day at work. Any doubt I had when I started residency is completely gone. It is such a stimulating and growing field and feels so great to know medicine and psychology, to learn neuroscience, pharmacology and talk therapy, and to really see patients get better under my care. If you love what you do and are good at it, you'll find your niche. Don't let naysayers in psychology or in medicine stop you. Rest assured that the field is not going anywhere, jobs are and will continue to be in demand (and if you are good, it doesn't matter if jobs are in demand, you will be in demand). Good luck with your decision.
That was incredibly long winded and if you got through it, congratulations and I hope it helps.
Best,
Worriedwell
