Factors influencing choice of career: A comparative study among medical, dental and pharmacy students in a private university in Malaysia

Abstract

Background: Students choose their careers based on many factors, which vary for every country. Recent advancements in healthcare systems have made pharmacy one of the most pursued professions. Aim: To study the factors that influence students in Malaysia to choose pharmacy as their career. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among first-year medicine, dentistry and pharmacy students in a private university in Malaysia. One-way analysis of variance followed by Tukey’s post-hoc test was used to determine the factors that influenced students’ career choices. Results: There were significant differences among medicine, dentistry and pharmacy students in the mean scores for the dimensions ‘economic status’, ‘personal background’, and ‘work-life balance’ which influenced their career choice. Conclusions: Economic status, personal background and work-life balance were the factors that significantly influenced students to choose pharmacy compared with students’ choice of dentistry and medicine.

Factors influencing choice of a pharmacy degree and career preferences of final year pharmacy students in Northern Nigeria: A multi-institutional study

“…The final category covers education related factors including good science background, role models etc. One or more factors from these categories have been reported as influencing choice of pharmacy by students all over the world (Hasan et al, 2010;Shen et al, 2014;Beedemariam et al, 2014;James et al, 2018;Al-Qudah et al, 2019;Alshehri et al, 2021;Isah et al, 2021;Sajjad et al, 2021). The most highly rated factors by respondents in this study largely fell within the first two groups (career/work related and intrinsic factors).…”

“…These options could include careers in hospital pharmacy, community pharmacy, industrial pharmacy, veterinary pharmacy and so on. Several studies have been carried out in many countries to assess career options and the factors affecting these choices among pharmacy students (Hasan et al, 2010;Ubaka et al, 2013;Shakeel et al, 2013;Salman et al, 2013;Loo et al, 2017;James et al, 2018;Alhomoud et al, 2019;Al-Qudah et al, 2019;Jarab et al, 2021). As would be expected, most of these studies have reported varying results (both for career choices and the factors influencing these choices).…”

“…As would be expected, most of these studies have reported varying results (both for career choices and the factors influencing these choices). Results from some of these studies have shown that pharmacy career choices maybe influenced by the year of study of respondents, with career preferences changing as students move up the academic ladder (Al-Qudah et al, 2019). This is not surprising as many of the factors known to influence career choices and perceptions are not 'static', and interact with each other, in addition to also evolving with the passage of time (Shen et al, 2014).…”

Influence of Oral Health Care Systems on Future Career Environment of Dental Students in Europe

“…The motivations for studying dentistry ranged from the desire to be capable of helping others [36,37], achieving self-esteem and interests related to health care, but also the chance to have a well-paid prestigious position are reasons for choosing the dental profession [36,37]. Moreover, personal and family background, work-life balance [38], professional/social status [39,40], job security, flexible work hours [39], professional independence [37], intellectual challenges, security, recommendation by others, and non-admission to other degree programs [37] play a role in the choice, with data on sex, ethnicity, mode of entry into college [41], parental education, and marital status [37]. Some underlying factors also influenced the career choice as professional work environment, health care, etc.…”