How do medical students view the work life of primary care and specialty physicians?

Student perceptions of day-to-day physician work life, and relationships between these perceptions and specialty choices, have not been quantitatively explored. The study's purposes were to measure student perceptions of primary care and specialist physician work life, including administrative burden, time pressures, autonomy, and relationships with patients, to determine whether senior students' perceptions vary from junior students' perceptions and to determine whether students with primary care career plans view primary care work life differently than their peers.

A cross-sectional anonymous survey was offered to all students at three allopathic US medical schools between 2006 and 2008.

Of 1,533 eligible students, 983 submitted usable surveys (response rate 64.1%). Students viewed the day-to-day work life of all physicians negatively but viewed primary care physician work life more negatively. Senior students viewed specialist work life more positively and primary care work life more negatively than junior students. Students planning primary care and specialist careers had similar views of primary care and specialist work life.

Students have negative views of the work life of all physicians, especially primary care physicians. Students planning careers in primary care share this negative view of their future work life, suggesting that their career choices are not based on different work life perceptions.