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Autism and medicine - is it worth pursuing diagnosis or will it be a barrier?

Panda

Hi guys! This is my first contribution the community, and a question has probably been asked before, but here goes...

In less than a month's time, I'll be submitting my ucas application to 4 universities, to study medicine. As a volunteer for a medical charity's youth programme, I've been given autism awareness training - when the trainer spoke about features of ASDs, how young people with autism might view the word differently from other people, I was shocked. I thought all of what she spoke about was normal, or if not normal then just one of my funny idiosyncracies. I went home, did some research and discovered that I meet many of the traits I read about and had the same difficulties. Now I'm debating whether a diagnosis is a good thing - I really don't like the idea of self - diagnosing, but I genuinely think I have it - confirmation I think would just be a trigger for looking at things differently and a way of explaining what has always been my "oddness".

Medicine is a career where empathy, teamwork, communication etc are essential, so the big question is will seeking diagnosis affect my chances? Admittedly nothing will happen until after applications have gone, but I'm still concerned that future employers may look at something like that, and, true to the stereotypes, doubt my competence and fitness to practice.

Any advice, comments or thoughts are welcome, and thank you all for your help.

Parents

  • I'd say that a lack of empathy could be a benefit.  In a medical setting I'd imagine that it would be useful to not be emotionally sympathetic whenpeople around you are ill or in pain.

    I'm certainly lacking in empathy, not just the ability to recognise or share emotions but also I very rarely care even if I understand the reasons for that emotion.  When managing people I've found that being detached emotionally certainly helps when faced with having to deliver bad news.  When someone was not behaving as required of their job I would just tell them, I genuinely didn't care if it would upset them.  If they weren't doing their job and there wasn't a good reason for it then I told them.  It's a double-edge sword though, people usually appreciated my straight talking but when faced with another person's emotional problems (which as a manager I was expected to deal with) I was lost.

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  • I'd say that a lack of empathy could be a benefit.  In a medical setting I'd imagine that it would be useful to not be emotionally sympathetic whenpeople around you are ill or in pain.

    I'm certainly lacking in empathy, not just the ability to recognise or share emotions but also I very rarely care even if I understand the reasons for that emotion.  When managing people I've found that being detached emotionally certainly helps when faced with having to deliver bad news.  When someone was not behaving as required of their job I would just tell them, I genuinely didn't care if it would upset them.  If they weren't doing their job and there wasn't a good reason for it then I told them.  It's a double-edge sword though, people usually appreciated my straight talking but when faced with another person's emotional problems (which as a manager I was expected to deal with) I was lost.

Children
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