EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT
BECOMING A PEDIATRICIAN
Are your students interested in biology and medicine, mathematics and physics? Do they aspire to become a doctor and improve patient’s health? Do they have a compassionate, patient and empathetic nature? Then, becoming a pediatrician could be the perfect career for them. The pediatricians’ role is advisory from early childhood to adolescence, both to parents and children. Find out more about this career with Elena Sotiriou, a Pediatrician at Limassol General Hospital.
Meet Elena Sotiriou
For this STEM Job Profile, we talked to Elena Sotiriou, Pediatrician at Limassol General Hospital. Pediatricians can work both in private doctor offices or in hospitals and clinics. They can also work as teachers in medical schools or as research fellows. At the hospital, Elena, examines children and gives them treatment. She also holds educational seminars to students at the medical school and pediatrics trainees.
“A book that I read as a child inspired me to study medicine. An enthusiastic doctor was the main character, but he felt that the big amount of money he was earning wasn’t the purpose of medicine. So, he decided to leave his profitable job and offer his help to people that really needed it and didn’t have the financial means. My decision to become a pediatrician came later as I was studying in medical school.”
Curious to find out more about this job? Read about the related skills and scroll down to find and download her career sheet!
SKILLS
Find out the key skills to becoming a Pediatrician.
Patience
Children find it hard to cooperate or describe what they feel. They can also fear visiting the doctor or intimidated by needles and medical examinations. A pediatrician must remain calm and help the children feel at ease in their presence.
Compassion
Pediatricians need to be compassionate and understanding of parents’ stress and agony when their children are ill. The figure of the pediatrician needs to remain calm and communicate in a collected manner even when announcing unpleasant news.
Empathy
Empathy is essential, without this feeling no doctor could do their best. This skill is even more important when dealing with children.
Problem-solving
Every patient is different, have different symptoms and reactions. A pediatrician dedicates time to finding out what exactly the problem is and come up with personalized treatments.
Work well under stress
Pediatricians have a very demanding daily routine. They have to manage patient loads, work long hours, prioritize tasks or supervise others.
Responsibility
A doctor should be very responsible and focused as mistakes are not allowed in this job and patients’ health is on their hands.
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Advice to take away
“I’d advise my students to decide on their own the career path they’d like to follow, without any intervention from third parties (parents or friends), and to choose a profession not thinking about its financial returns but if it would make them happy.”
– Elena Sotiriou
This career sheet was submitted by Zoe Kofina and is among the winners of the STEM Alliance & STE(A)M IT – Professionals Go Back to Schools Competition 2021.
The STE(A)M IT project has received funding from the European Union’s ERASMUS+ programme project STE(A)M IT (Grant agreement 612845-EPP-1-2019-BE-EPPKA3-PI-FORWARD) coordinated by European Schoolnet (EUN). The content of the document is the sole responsibility of the organizer and it does not represent the opinion of the European Commission (EC), and the EC is not responsible for any use that might be made of the information contained.
