5 Most In-Demand Medical Specialties

One of the factors that medical students should consider when choosing their medical specialty is how plentiful doctor jobs are in a given specialty. It’s certainly not the only factor, but unless a medical student is determined to enter a particular specialty, or unless he or she is especially swayed by specialties that have the most regular hours (like dermatology, radiology, and ophthalmology), demand should factor into the specialty decision-making.

Following are five of the most in-demand among medical specialties. Three of the five are heavily oriented toward primary healthcare, and while the other two are more specialized, they’re also geared toward improving patients’ overall health rather than addressing specific physiologic systems or procedures.

1. Family Medicine

Family medicine may be considered a specialty, but it has a tremendous scope. A family physician may care for a sick baby with colic, an elderly person with arthritis, and everything in between. As primary care doctor jobs go, family medicine will probably deliver the greatest range of patient types and a wider variety of diagnoses and in-office procedures than other specialties. As healthcare policy and insurer initiatives focus more on preventive and primary care, family doctors will continue to be in high demand.

2. Psychiatry

The psychiatry specialty may take clinicians to hospital environments, outpatient clinics or some combination of practice settings. Psychiatrists may set up their own practices, practice as part of a group, or be employed by a clinical facility. Psychiatric research is a sub-specialty available to those who specialize in psychiatry. As the connections between mental health and the health of the rest of the body are further explored and elucidated, psychiatry will continue to grow in importance as a specialty that supports people’s overall health.

3. Internal Medicine

Internal medicine specialists often serve as primary care physicians, but they’re likelier to serve only the adult population. Medical students interested in jobs providing primary care, but who prefer not to include pediatrics, may find internal medicine to be a good fit for them. At the same time, there are many internal medicine subspecialties, including hematology, oncology, immunology, and vascular medicine, should an internal medicine physician find that his or her interests veer toward a particular type of illness or intervention.

4. Ob-Gyn

While they’re not technically considered primary care physicians, many Ob-Gyn specialists are the de facto primary care doctors for women in their childbearing years. In addition to family planning, contraception, pregnancy care and delivery, some Ob-Gyns monitor patients’ overall health during yearly check-ups. Some Ob-Gyns, however, strictly limit the primary care services they provide, referring patients to other doctors for mental health issues, metabolic issues, or care that is clearly outside the scope of the Ob-Gyn practice.

5. Hospitalists

Hospitalists are the doctors who provide primary care for patients in inpatient settings. Their focus is on the general medical care of people in the hospital, and the scope of their practice may include teaching, research, and leadership in the hospital environment. Because they spend the majority of their practice time inside the hospital, hospitalists are more readily available to patients than their admitting physician might be. Hospitalists in teaching hospitals may also play an important role in training and mentoring of resident physicians.

The really high-paying medical specialties, like cardiac surgery and orthopedic surgery, offer salaries that may be double what highly in-demand, primary care specialties do. But those high salaries come with tremendous responsibilities, unpredictable hours, and less opportunity for good work-life balance. Nonetheless, some medical students understand the challenges and pursue those highly specific specialties and excel in them. However, as far as demand is shaped by the American public and insurers, doctor jobs concerned with primary care are expected to be the most abundant over the next decade.