Opinion - Qualitative Research on Medical Students’ Professional Identity Formation Fall 2021 |Biomedgrid

Medical students grapple with their professional identities from the moment they are admitted to medical school to when they graduate (Adams et al., 2020). One of the goals of the MD program of a medical school is to help students appreciate what it means to be a physician and to become one [1]. My research topic explores how medical students form their professional identities during medical school. Medical students are held to the same standard as practicing physicians even while they are still in medical school. During their white coat ceremony, medical students swear to uphold the modern version of the hippocratic oath which graduating physicians also swear allegiance to upon induction into a medical board. Medical students are the lowest rank of the medical team but nonetheless play an important role in the care that is delivered in teaching hospitals and practices scattered all over the country [1].