What type of doctor do you want to be?


Ah, that familiar question. What type of doctor do YOU want to be?

It is easily in the top 5 questions I get asked. Seriously – even by random acquaintances.

The simple answer to that is that I am not really sure. I have interests, of course, but I am trying my best to keep an open mind. 

As I've mentioned before, I loved my family medicine rotation, which I am happy about because that was up there in what I thought I wanted to do. I like that you have a lot of freedom in what you want to focus on (urgent care, procedures, women’s health) and you get to see a little bit of everything. The 9 to 5 schedule is hard to beat, too. I don’t think I would be interested in opening my own practice though because I wouldn’t want to deal with the business side of it.

So far, psychiatry has been both challenging and eye-opening. It is easy to assume that people with addictions and mental illness are worlds away from you and me, but that is simply not the case. We are more the same than we are different. We all seek acceptance, happiness, and stability in our lives. Some people just get dealt a tougher hand than others. Some people have genetic predispositions. And through talking to patients about their childhoods, I’ve realized that some people hardly get a fair chance. At least not at what you would consider a “normal” life. 

One of the psychiatry residents I worked with told me that he never pictured himself as a psychiatrist but he always found himself being drawn towards to patients with mental health issues. I am seriously wondering if that will be my experience given my love for psychology through undergrad.

 Choosing a speciality feels like choosing not only a career - but a lifestyle. Can I have a "basketball team" of children AND do an intense specialty? Do we want to start our family during residency? How high do I prioritize work-life balance? It seems to be more meaningful to me every year that goes by. One thing I know is that I want to work directly with people and build rapport to have open communication. 

 I am honestly excited for every rotation and I am hoping to get some good experience and exposure to many fields. I am particularly looking forward to my ob-gyn rotation and I am also considering doing electives in emergency medicine and neurology. I want the inspiration to come to me naturally - without trying to force myself to like something. Plus, I think that figuring out what I don't want to do is just as important. 

 So with all this in mind, I decided to do a Medical Specialty Aptitude Test that I found on another blog by someone from Saba (sabamdthenlife.blogspot.com) and here are my results! I'm not sure that it reflects what I am interested in, but it's all in good fun, right?

 https://www.med-ed.virginia.edu/specialties/ for anyone wants to check it out.



And a couple silly flow charts to help with your decision




I may not know what specialty I want to do yet, but I am pretty excited for the journey to figure that out.

I see another post like this in my future when I have some more experience... 

Thanks for reading,
Kim

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