Myers-Briggs type and medical specialty choice: a new look at an old question.

BACKGROUND: Career development of health professionals is one of many uses of Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), with many studies reported from the 1950s. Since 1977, no large-scale effort to collect data on the medical school population has been reported. PURPOSE: To determine (a) changes in MBTI profiles of medical students over time, (b) differences between the profiles of men and women and the effects of the increased number of women in medical school, (c) possible associations between type and career choices, and (d) possible type differences of graduates selecting primary care and specialties. METHOD: Twelve U.S. schools with data on 3,987 students contributed to a database of their graduates' MBTI type and specialty choice at Match. RESULTS: Compared with data from the 1950s, the type distribution of physicians has remained fairly stable, save for a trend toward more judging types. Women in medicine today are more representative of the general population on the feeling dimension than earlier, when medicine was more male-dominated. Women are more likely than men to choose primary care specialties, as are those with preference for introversion and feeling. Feeling types choose Family Medicine significantly more often than thinking types; male, extraverted, and thinking types choose surgical specialties. Of those selecting nonprimary care, male, extraverted, and thinking types choose surgical specialties significantly more than women, introverted, and feeling types. CONCLUSION: Type remains useful for understanding how some aspects of personality relate to medical specialty choice.

Implementing and evaluating a patient instructor program.

A Patient Instructor (PI) program designed to improve students' data-gathering and interpersonal skills is evaluated. Each student in two consecutive classes of third-year students (class of 1996, n = 60; class of 1997, n = 72) interviewed four patient instructors (PIs) during a three-hour rotation. Each PI portrayed one of six scenarios. PIs assessed students using content checklists and an abbreviated Arizona Clinical Interview Rating Scale (ACIR). After the interview, each PI gave student constructive feedback regarding interpersonal behavior and ability to identify salient content items from the patient's history. Significant improvement was observed on content checklists (p < 0.01) between the first and second rounds. Significant improvement was also noted on the ACIR (p < 0.01) between rounds one, two and three. The results indicate that data-gathering and interpersonal skills can be enhanced by using patient instructors. Student evaluation of the program was positive.

Using patient-instructors to teach and evaluate interviewing skills.

The teaching and evaluation of clinical interviewing skills is a continuing challenge for medicine and dentistry. The use of patient-instructors who provide consistency in presenting scenarios has recently been pioneered in dental education. This program focused primarily on teaching and used patient-instructors to give individual feedback from the patient's perspective to students after each of five scenarios. Feedback was constructive and behaviorally oriented so that it could be applied immediately to succeeding scenarios. Rating instruments assessed both process and content skills. Results indicated that students improved significantly in interpersonal interviewing skills as they progressed through the exercise. Content skills improved only slightly. Student and faculty reaction was positive. The program is an effective and time efficient means of teaching history taking and interviewing skills as well as an effective evaluation tool.

Overcoming barriers to permanency planning.

The authors describe their success with a permanency planning project that emphasized interagency cooperation and worked from the thesis that every child is adoptable if return to the biological family is not possible.

Relationship of patient characteristics to program attendance by women alcoholics.

High attendance levels in an outpatient program by women alcoholics of lower socioeconomic status were not associated with increased abstinence or employment. Social relationships, previous employment and drinking history were, however, related to greater attendance, abstinence and employment.