Why do doctors run in families?

[Beafortea]

Why do doctors' kids often all end up being doctors? You seem to find that doctors are usually from families of multiple generations of doctors. Why is that?

Curious because you'd think with the state of things for junior doctors, parents would be encouraging their kids to pick another career?

Strong vocational element? Hereditary component of good at sciences plus desire to help people? Despite all the moaning it is a well paid job with a decent pension?
My family are all doctors, my DS wants to be one, they all told him not to - he takes no notice….

It's hard not to show a passion for something like being a doctor which I'm sure children pick up on despite warnings from their parents about the work environment.

Also having doctor relatives makes it easier to access work experience and allows then to be well prepared at interviews for med school which I would assume makes them more likely to be accepted onto the course than those without medic family members.

Just as simple as ‘educated parents = educated children’. Middle class teens are far more likely to feel confident going for competitive/long degree courses.

We stopped.
everyone doctors from great grand parents to father, uncles, aunts.
my generation solicitors accountants engineers

Yup despite all the warnings they’re given children of doctors become doctors. I think it’s a combination of aptitude, encouragement and seeing their parents have a pretty good quality of life all thing considered.

My kids stayed far away from medicine!

My dad and 2 of my younger siblings are doctors. A bit of nepotism in the sense that he could help them get good experience for their personal statements etc to get into medical school in the first place, help with questions or issues they might have had along the way etc. They saw that it was and remains a well paid job with a clear path to promotions.

Easy work experience. They grow up seeing their parents do it so realise it is possible?

I had a major surgery a few years back and when i googled the (female) surgeon I discovered her complete family tree… and it turned out they were all doctors since the 18th century! It was sort of comforting, like she really knew what she was doing.

It is the same with teachers, i also know families where everyone is a teacher.

Ease of work experience.
(In the case of a couple of young doctors I know) masses of help with applications.

Plus despite the complaints doctors have, their offspring must see it as a secure and well rewarded and regarded career. Or surely they wouldn't do it.

I’m first in my family to go to uni and am a doctor. I love my job despite the current very real problems in the NHS. None of my kids have shown any interest preferring to study other science topics. Locally all work experience has to be coordinated via the medical school individuals can no longer just bring their kids in. When I was in sixth form (a very long time ago!) the only work experience school could arrange for me was in a factory producing medical goods.

We have lot of doctors in my family, the approach that gets them into medicine ranges from a true desire to help people to parents, who are themselves doctors, badgering their kids with tales of financial hardship if they choose another degree.

Well I'm not surprised. Often actors have actor children, lawyers have lawyer children, teachers have teacher children etc.
if you show a particular aptitude for sciences (drama, law) then hardly surprising that your children might too.
And by the time doctors have kids, they are generally over the 36 hour shifts for less than minimum wage stage, so kids might not see the work put in to qualify and get ahead.

I think there's a mixture of personality (genetic), and having the right environment. Plus I think there is a tendency for dc to follow their parents' footsteps-you get teacher's dc becoming teachers etc.

But also medicine is one where they do put a certain priority in having experience. I have medics in the family, and friends who are medics in various capacities. If one of mine was interested, then I could arrange several impressive looking work experience with a quick email/message and no effort at all.
If you don't have those connections then it's much harder-added to which people will always choose to take on the dc of a friend/relative rather than an unknown.
I don't think it's fair, but it does happen.

It's falling off massively now as doctors are no longer encouraging their kids to be doctors, and the kids are seeing the life looks a bit shit.

You could similarly ask why so many actors children go into acting or why people pass on their family businesses?

It's because the parents make it look interesting and the children grow up having an idea how to get into the industry.

My DM was a nurse and I became a doctor - because she made medicine look incredibly exciting, at the time if you were getting the grades you did medicine not nursing, and I wanted a job that was better paid than hers. Had no idea at all about careers outside healthcare.

I think there's a few factors.

Some of it is certainly genetic / aptitude - having the right skills & interest levels.

I think for those who see it as a vocation, that's probably an inherited thing foo - a genuine interest in the challenge within a particular field.

In Ireland, where I am, there is an additional prestige - it's a maximum points entry course via our CAO system (a bit like UCAS but run differently) and certain parents really push that, regardless of interest or aptitude in the area.

My brother is a doctor; my eldest DD has been adamant her whole life she wants to be a surgeon. I don't see how it's going to be possible for her given how hard it is to get in but of course I'll support her trying.

The family tradition follows in lots of other professions too tho eg all my family going back many generations were teachers; I really wanted to teach, was strongly discouraged & did something else, sometime later I circuitously ended up in an academic teaching role, which felt exactly right. There's a strong genetic pull I think.

Despite all the so called drawbacks it’s still a decent career.

You have to be pretty privileged to get into medical school, you need to have had opportunities and had space to study. Networks remain incredibly important. Like any profession it comes with a language and if you can speak the language then you look like you fit so you're more likely to be selected.

Seeing your parents go into work 7 days a week, if felt normal to do the same.
Always told by them there are so many different options when studying medicine.
Didn't know what else to do 😁.

None of my DC however have gone to medical school. One is squeamish just looking at blood🤣

Nurses run in families too!

my grandfather and his brother were doctors but my mum and uncle both read history at Uni. Even though my mum was very clever she hated science.

I went to school with a lot of children of doctors and a significant number of them went on to be doctors. Things are possibly changing now but it has always been seen as a prestigious career, ensuring a secure financial future.

1. People need work experience to get into medical school and that can be more easily arranged if you have parents who are doctors
2. Parents talking about their work at home probably sparks the interest of the children
3. Some parents of the girls I went to school with expected nothing less than that their child would go into medicine, whether they really wanted to or not - this was particularly the case of families originally from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh
4. Once children are at the age of applying to medical school, the parents are higher up the career ladder and have possibly forgotten about the junior doctor hell, or see it as a means to an end.
5. Most children of doctors have academic advantages in that a) aptitude for scientific subjects does tend to run in families and b) the parents have the financial means to ensure the child receives the support they need to do well - independent school, tutoring to enter grammar school, tutoring during the secondary years.

Inter-generational privilege.

I’m a doctor but from a working class family. I was unusual in my year group.

My work is intense and meaningful. I resuscitate people for a living. I don’t dissuade my kid from pursuing this or any other kind of meaningful work, no matter how hard.

I was the first doctor in my family on either side and the only one in my own generation. None of my own children or my cousins' children have gone into medicine or any branch of health care. My children's father was also the only doctor in a large extended family. However, it's true that often doctors cluster in families.

My parents are both in medicine and they both put me off for life at a very young age

well, apart from a tough initial period, there’s an excellent career ahead for medics- great money & progression, plus rewarding and fulfilling role. Most jobs you get one or the other, rarely both. So no wonder it runs in families.
Medics children will also have an advantage over peers and therefore more likely to actually get a place- in terms of the educational opportunities that their parents profession will provide, inherited academic aptitude, and frankly priceless help with experience and applications.