Medical students’ views of medicine as a calling and selection of a primary care-related residency

Abstract

With the US health care system facing a primary care physician shortage, we evaluated whether medical students who saw medicine as a calling were more likely to enter a family medicine, internal medicine, or pediatrics residency program. Of the 591 4th-year medical students who responded to a survey item on medicine as a calling, 237 strongly agreed that the “practice of medicine is a calling.” Students who strongly agreed that medicine was a calling had higher odds (P =.003) of selecting a primary care-related residency. Identifying with medicine as a calling may increase the likelihood of pursuing a primary care career.