"He wants to study medicine, but with AI, will it still be a good career?" Parents of teenagers aiming for medicine ask this more and more. It is a fair question: AI already reads medical images, helps with diagnoses and summarises patient files.
I am not a doctor. I prepare students for selective studies, medicine among them, and I follow closely what AI changes in careers and in the way we learn. Here I share what I tell families.
What AI does in medicine, and what it leaves to the doctor
AI is very effective at well-defined tasks: spotting an anomaly on an image, cross-referencing thousands of publications, suggesting hypotheses. It does not carry responsibility for a decision, does not examine a patient, does not break bad news, and does not choose between two treatments with a whole life in mind.
Tomorrow's doctors will work with these tools as they work today with imaging or lab tests: they will need to know when to trust them and when to be wary. And the need for care is not falling, with an ageing population.
What changes for a student aiming for medicine
The studies remain long and selective. What makes students succeed in the first year changes little: solid foundations in biology, chemistry and physics, a great capacity for work, a method to memorise a lot quickly, and good results in high school, since selection starts with the application.
What gains value, on the other hand: scientific and statistical reasoning, to read a study and judge a result, including a machine's; English, the language of medical research; and human qualities, listening, clarity, composure, which medical schools abroad already assess at interview.
Mathematics, often neglected
Many French students aiming for medicine drop mathematics at the end of première to keep biology and physics-chemistry. It is a common and defensible choice. But a mathematics option in the final year and a real grasp of statistics help in the first year of medicine, where biostatistics is on the programme, and later in reading medical literature and judging what AI tools suggest.
In France and elsewhere
In France, access goes through a selective first year at university, whose organisation changes from September 2027 (see the box). In the United Kingdom, students apply straight from school, with an aptitude test, the UCAT, and interviews. In the United States, medicine is studied after a four-year first degree. For a student in a French lycée, these three routes are not prepared in the same way or at the same time.
If your child is aiming for medicine, or hesitating, the most useful step is to measure where they stand and choose their subjects with full knowledge. That is what I do in the level and guidance assessment, and over several years in an action plan.
The September 2027 reform in France. According to Service Public (29 April 2026), PASS and L.AS are replaced from September 2027 by a single programme of health studies, with a first year harmonised nationwide, for medicine, midwifery, dentistry, pharmacy and physiotherapy. Students can apply at the end of the first and second years of the degree, and ranking covers their whole record. The implementing texts should be checked on the Ministry of Higher Education's website.