Compare Medical Specialties
Compare residency length, attending compensation, clinical work and fellowship paths across three specialties.
| Characteristic | Anesthesiology | Psychiatry | Family Medicine |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fellowship Expectation | 2/5 | 2/5 | 1/5 |
| Fellowship Career Path | Do not assume that cardiac OR, ICU, chronic-pain clinic and routine OR anesthesia are interchangeable lifestyles. Observe the settings before deciding whether further training serves your preferred work. | Decide whether you enjoy general adult psychiatry before investing in a subspecialty identity. If child/adolescent psychiatry appeals, ask programs about early-entry routes and how they affect residency time. | Choose residency for actual scope; OB, inpatient coverage, procedures, rural training; rather than assuming a future fellowship will repair missing core exposure. |
| Direct Practice Without Fellowship | General operating-room anesthesia, perioperative care and procedural anesthesia. | General adult psychiatry in inpatient, outpatient, community or telehealth practice. | Outpatient primary care, many rural and broad-scope generalist roles. |
| Relative Competitiveness | 62/100 | 54/100 | 33/100 |
| Typical Training | 3+1 years | 4 years | 3 years |
| National Attending Compensation | $557,131 · Doximity 2026 · Average Total Compensation · 2025 Data | $350,786 · Doximity 2026 · Average Total Compensation · 2025 Data | $325,040 · Doximity 2026 · Average Total Compensation · 2025 Data |
| Projected employment change, 2025–2035 | +4% | +7% | +3% |
| Practice settings | Operating rooms, procedural suites, labor and delivery, critical care and pain clinics. | Outpatient practice, inpatient psychiatry, consultation-liaison and community mental health. | Community clinics, primary care, urgent care, rural hospitals and outpatient practices. |
| Scheduling considerations | Operating-room start times, overnight call, and in-house coverage vary by practice and training rotation. | Outpatient and telehealth roles may have predictable sessions; inpatient and emergency coverage can add call. | Outpatient schedules are common; obstetrics, inpatient and rural practice can add call. |
| Procedures / clinical tasks | Airway management and endotracheal intubation • Regional anesthesia and nerve blocks • Perioperative monitoring • Procedural sedation | Psychiatric assessment • Psychotherapy • Medication management • Electroconvulsive therapy in trained settings | Office procedures • Joint injections • Preventive screening • Chronic disease management |
| Example fellowship options | Pain medicine • Critical care medicine • Cardiothoracic anesthesiology • Pediatric anesthesiology | Child and adolescent psychiatry • Addiction psychiatry • Geriatric psychiatry • Consultation-liaison psychiatry | Sports medicine • Geriatric medicine • Hospice and palliative medicine • Addiction medicine |
| AI-related tasks | Potential uses include monitoring decision support, perioperative documentation, risk prediction and operating room scheduling; human oversight and procedural responsibility remain essential. | Administrative tasks and symptom monitoring may be augmented; therapeutic rapport, risk assessment and complex care decisions remain clinician-led. | Documentation, preventive outreach and decision support may be augmented; continuity, communication and clinical judgment remain core. |
Sources & Data Notes
Reviewed . National attending compensation uses Doximity's 2026 specialty survey (2025 pay) where available, then verified specialty-specific Medscape, Marit or Salary.com estimates. Doximity, Medscape and Marit report total compensation; Salary.com models base salary. Survey averages, modeled salaries and BLS wage medians measure different populations and must not be interpreted as identical metrics. BLS May 2025 state wages are shown separately and exclude self-employed physicians. The ophthalmology BLS category excludes pediatric ophthalmologists. State figures may be missing, top-coded, or suppressed. Job outlook uses BLS 2025–2035 occupational projections; it is not a local vacancy forecast. Resident stipend examples reflect published institutional scales for 2026 to 2027, by postgraduate year, not specialty. Stanford includes housing in its reported base salary; other institutions handle allowances differently.
The Relative Competitiveness Index uses a fixed score of 25 plus 1.75 times the 2024 U.S. MD preferred-specialty unmatched percentage, rounded, then applies the same 1.225 multiplier to every specialty. Neurological Surgery is 98/100; the score is not the applicant's chance of matching. It is not a 2026 estimate or DO-specific score. The MD and DO percentages compare different unadjusted applicant cohorts who ranked that specialty first. They do not account for application strategy, program selection, scores, or geography. Ophthalmology and urology have separate specialty match processes; other pathways may lack suitable NRMP cohorts.
The 1–5 Fellowship Expectation Index is an editorial assessment of customary career paths, not a measured participation rate or requirement. For residency profiles, compact training labels put specialty years before the clinical base or preliminary year; e.g. 3+1 means three specialty years and one clinical base year, even though the clinical year comes first. Fellowship-defined careers are presented in the separate fellowship explorer. Schedules, procedural scope, preparation suggestions, and potential AI effects depend on the program and practice setting; they are qualitative descriptions, not guaranteed outcomes or forecasts of physician replacement.