Career Intentions and Perceptions of General Practice on Entry to Medical School

Shreeya Bhogle 
A career in general practice can be like marmite to medical students - they either love it or hate it.

However, interestingly, medical graduates from the universities of Oxford and Cambridge have a lower intention to become GPs compared with other UK medical graduates. A 6-year prospective cohort study aims to understand what factors are underlying this, and has yielded some interesting results from its first year. 

The study involved an online survey of medical students admitted in autumn 2020 to the three East of England medical schools: University of East Anglia (UEA), University of Cambridge (UOC), and Anglia Ruskin University (ARU). It found that UOC students’ lower intention to become a GP appears to be present on entry to medical school, and that this may be explained in part by these students placing a higher importance on research/academic opportunities, combined with the widely held perception that GP careers lack these opportunities. 

These findings suggest a need to address perceptions of lack of research/academic opportunities in GP careers to raise the profile of academic general practice. This will help guide how we at Cambridge GPSoc plan our upcoming events and lecture/workshop themes for our conference on 5th March 2022. Keep an eye on our social media accounts for more updates!

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You can read the paper for yourself here: https://bjgpopen.org/content/5/6/BJGPO.2021.0120