Abstract

Objective: The recruitment of top medical students to the field of psychiatry is a growing concern. In this study, to investigate the attitudes of medical students towards psychiatry residency was aimed. Method: Forty-two nurses working at daytime and 45 nurses working at the night shift were evaluated with Symptom Checklist-90-R (SCL-90-R) and Short Form 36 (SF-36) for assessing general psychiatric symptoms and quality of life. Results: One hundred thirty seven medical students participated to the study. 18.2% of the participants have placed psychiatry among the most interesting three specialties, and 16% of them, among the less three attractive specialties. There was only one student who found psychiatry prestigious. The proportion of the students who had thought that money was a reason for preference was 50.3% and 75.9% of them reported that geographic features are important on their preference. The proportion of students who believed that ?someone who prefer psychiatry as a career, should live in developed cities? was 69.3%. The proportion of students ?believing that improvement of patients after the treatment is important in choosing a specialty? was 81.8%. Conclusion: It was observed that the importance of specialties which have controllable, prestigious features for their life quality have been increasing among medical students. However, these features were not the only determinants in their preference of specialty.

Key words: Psychiatry residency, attitude, career, prestige