Specialty choice of medical graduates

Abstract

Objective: To investigate the specialty choice of Hong Kong medical graduates. Design: Mailed questionnaire survey. Subjects: A total of 139 students who attended the General Practice Unit of the University of Hong Kong for their general practice teaching during 1993 were surveyed in the second half of 1995 i.e. approximately 12 months after graduation. Complete data were collected for 88 (63.5%) of the graduates after four rounds of mailing. Results: General Medicine was the most popular with 48 (54.5%) graduates selecting it as one of their combined top three choices, followed by Accident & Emergency (A&E) (36 graduates, 40.9%) and General Practice (35 graduates, 39.8%). Male and female graduates showed similar patterns except towards Surgical specialties and Obstetrics and Gynaecology (O&G). Conclusions: These results provide indication on the competitiveness of specialty choices and the need for specialty counselling for junior doctors. It also reveals the possibility of an undecided stage towards specialty choice at the end of internship and raises the need for general rotation during early postgraduate years.