Limitations of the Medical Specialty Preference Inventory (MSPI) for Radiation Oncology.

The Medical Specialty Preference Inventory (MSPI), offered through the Association of American Medical Colleges Careers in Medicine website, is a widely utilized tool to aid medical students in career decision-making. Students who complete the MSPI are asked to rate 150 items on a 7-point Likert-type scale in terms of their desirability to the respondent as part of their future medical practice. The generated output of the MSPI gives a percent-probability that the student will enter each of 19 evaluated specialties that participate in the main residency match. However, the predictive validity of the MSPI is lowest (12.6%) for radiation oncology among all specialties. Radiation oncology, among other small specialties, is considered to be at high risk of being overshadowed in the model by large specialties like internal medicine. This manuscript highlights the limitations of the MSPI for radiation oncology, and suggests several opportunities to mitigate its deficiencies and improve students' knowledge and decision-making related to a career in radiation oncology.