Age at Graduation and Physician Specialty

Summary - Younger graduates are more likely to choose subspecialties and major medical center locations. Older graduates have greater choice of family medicine and psychiatry and careers in rural and underserved areas. The younger graduates have the greatest connections to major medical centers for the first 30 years of their lives, higher percentages were born in medical school counties or were raised there as seen in Asian (23% of total now) and foreign born (16% of total now) US MD Grads. Mean age is staying unchanged however there are increased admissions of the youngest and also some balance with older graduates in Historically Black medical schools and schools that admit lower income, rural born, Black, and Mexican American students (.

Data Sources

All US Medical Graduates from 1965 - 2000 listed in the AMA Masterfile

Board Certified FM group from efforts of Robert C. Bowman, AMA Masterfile, and Robert Graham Center

AMA Masterfile data and consultation from Robert Graham Center via Ed Fryer

Note that with advancing years past medical school graduation, residency, and fellowship, there are changes in some specialties that may reflect in the following percentages. Use of graduates since 1965 tends to minimize this effect on more recent graduates.

The expansion years of 1971 - 1981 saw great increases in admissions of those who were older, but then leveled off.

Table on Age of Medical School Grad and Choice of Specialty - those increasing choice with age, no change, or increase then decrease (EM, Pathology, Anesthesia)

Age of Graduate	All FP/GP	FM Boarded Grads 1994 - 2000	Psych	IntMed	EM	Path	Anesth
22	11.4	19.6	4.8	15.9	2.4	1.4	3.8
24	9.1	10.0	4.4	17.1	3.8	2.2	4.2
26	12.3	12.8	3.9	16.9	4.1	1.9	4.6
28	15.4	15.4	4.1	16.5	5.3	2.0	5.3
30	17.1	15.5	4.9	16.6	5.8	2.4	5.6
32	19.0	17.3	5.5	15.8	6.1	2.6	6.1
34	20.5	18.7	6.3	16.0	6.2	2.5	6.5
36	22.7	20.7	6.9	16.3	5.8	2.3	6.3
38	25.2	24.8	7.4	17.0	5.5	2.2	6.0
40	26.5	22.8	7.6	17.3	5.1	2.6	4.9
42	28.4	25.7	9.3	18.4	4.7	2.0	5.7
44	31.9	27.6	8.9	18.5	3.4	2.0	4.5
46	32.8	29.2	8.0	19.2	3.9	2.7	3.3
48	38.2	30.6	8.8	16.3	4.0	0.7	3.5
50	34.6	26.2	12.3	16.4	2.2	1.3	2.2

Age and Physician Specialty graphics and figures here

Those with behavioral, front line, primary care components increase with age of graduate.

For those who list their primary specialty as internal medicine, the number is amazingly constant at 15 - 17% for all ages from 20 - 50 years at graduation and from all class years of graduation from 1965 to present.

Pathology also holds its own well over age at graduation.

Anesthesia does increase in the years with more medical student graduates as seen below, before decreasing.

Age of Medical School Grad and Choice of Specialty - those with flat or declining distribution with age

Age of Grad	% in ObGyn	Diag Rad	Peds	Gen Surg	Ortho	Card	Ophth
22	3.79	5.52	6.55	8.28	2.41	4.14	6.55
24	5.54	4.46	7.62	5.29	3.42	3.94	4.50
26	5.99	4.10	9.06	5.17	4.23	3.19	3.26
28	6.15	3.68	8.32	5.01	3.97	2.30	2.48
30	6.18	3.15	7.00	4.74	3.26	1.86	2.30
32	5.98	3.25	6.09	4.47	2.85	1.62	2.29
34	5.90	2.98	5.67	3.63	2.15	1.18	2.04
36	5.94	3.01	5.30	2.74	1.72	1.01	2.09
38	5.67	2.89	5.10	2.57	1.11	0.89	1.18
40	5.21	2.96	5.30	2.46	0.77	0.84	1.22
42	3.84	2.08	4.80	1.84	0.44	0.32	1.12
44	3.43	3.17	4.22	1.32	0.20	0.26	0.66
46	3.98	1.70	3.64	1.25	0.11	0.34	0.23
48	3.09	0.66	3.97	1.10	0.00	0.44	0.66
50	1.94	1.30	3.67	1.73	0.00	0.00	0.22

The studies involve 489,000 US physicians according to self-designated primary specialty.

Leveled off in past 20 years for most age categories.

Birth Origins Articles

Research By the Ages

Questions to rbowman@unmc.edu

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