QUICK ANSWER It is generally believed that doctors have such bad handwriting because they are often in such a hurry, both physically and mentally. This is not to say that all doctors have unreadable handwriting. However, multiple studies by the open-access medical journal BMJ show that only 24 percent of doctors get a good or excellent rating for their handwriting and 37 percent of doctors get a poor rating for their handwriting. FULL ANSWER In these multiple peer-reviewed studies, doctors admitted that their sloppy handwriting goes hand in hand with their workload. As patients fill up the waiting room, the quality of their handwriting decreases. Interestingly, a number of doctors admitted that they developed their chicken scratch handwriting under the belief that doctors are supposed to have bad handwriting. This led the BMJ to conclude that some doctors simply write bad on purpose. Although doctors are known for having bad handwriting, the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine says that this is a clear area that needs to be addressed. This group suggests that illegible handwriting is often mistaken for sloppy care by juries and leads to damaging testimonies in the courtroom. It also gives patients more leverage in malpractice suits against doctors. Well, this doctor on Quora seems to have an answer and it does make sense! Here are excerpts: "I got first prize in handwriting competition in school. But, now. Holy lord. During exam, one can call the first page of my sheet as etched by a craftman. A damn perfect cursive writing. Beautifully written words. Later, even I can't read my own stuff. We have to complete long answers in minimum time. Anxiety kills us. We are not given any choices in exams. We have to write everything. Trust me, it is not what it seems to be in a non medico exam. So, we develop poor handwriting. Damn our exams." -Aarushi Sharma Source 1 Source 2
Right after our Pre-medical everyone of us faces altogether a new field, new phase of life with so much of studies,so much of changing trends,so much up to date knowledge! Medical studies being very much diverse and keeping in mind the time , we usually are exposed to very very n very much fasting writing ,quick grasping ! Lectures are delivered at a rate much faster to b called unusual ! In addition we also have so many practicals to write ! Our exams are also far from usual (in non-medico exams one tries to put in all he knows atleast, contrary to that we write much less than we actually know all coz of time constraint...we aren't provided with any choice in d questions n we can't bear to leave any question unattempted ... Much we do in quite little time!). Above all this field doesn't give anyone a second chance and one has to take an action in time ,any delay not accepted here coz dealings with life-humans! Keeping in view this all we are trained, in this course we usually lose our handwriting that's quite natural !We are grown with a whole lot of good things in us except for our handwriting ! I remember in my Physiology exams I wrote 42 A4 pages in js 3 hrs along wd 10s of colorful diagrams ;-) ;-)
exactly! before med school my handwriting was very clear and organized. Since I started studying medicine, I sometimes can't read my handwriting in my lecture notes!
What everyone telling here is true. I was known for my handwriting until the med school exams came up. Even in med school I had beautiful handwriting in the first two years, then our first bar exam happened. 6 essay questions are to be written in 3 hrs. 1 question has its own 3 or more sub questions for which we must write about 1 page most of the times...(Depends on the question) So during the exam I was writing at my best speed and didnt care how it looked, theres no time to go through the answer again but it looked like even I couldnt read myself. Since then no matter how I try I cant write as beautiful as it used to be
