scholarly journals A Cross-Sectional Study of Undergraduate Teaching of Trauma and Orthopaedics in the UK and the Relationship Between Medical Schools and Interest in Trauma and Orthopaedics as a Career

2022 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
pp. 238212052110727
Author(s):  
Sarah Choi ◽  
Setthasorn Ooi ◽  
Eleanor Carpenter

INTRODUCTION Adequate exposure and teaching of Trauma and Orthopaedics (T&O) to medical students is fundamental in order to obtain sufficient knowledge and sustain their interest in T&O as a career. The primary aim is to assess the exposure and delivery of T&O at all medical schools in the UK. The secondary aim is to determine whether there are any associations between attending a particular medical school and having a strong interest in pursuing a career in T&O. METHODS To explore the primary aim, all 33 UK medical schools were investigated in the study, by means of a questionnaire distributed to medical students. This did not include ‘new’ medical schools, defined as those established from 2014 onwards. To investigate the secondary aim of exploring associations between students’ and alumni's medical schools and their interest in T&O as a career, British Orthopaedic Training Association (BOTA) members were reviewed, using the General Medical Council register to identify the universities from which members had graduated. The authors have made the assumption that membership of BOTA signified an interest in T&O as a career. RESULTS Results were obtained for all 33 medical schools. The mean total teaching time specifically for T&O throughout medical school was 18 days, ranging from 3 to 60 days in total. 118 BOTA members were reviewed. No member of BOTA in the study had attended medical school in Keele, Liverpool, Plymouth or Lancashire. These universities taught below the national average number of days in T&O. DISUCSSION There is a large national variance in the number of compulsory teaching days provided for T&O. The authors advocate medical schools to aim for at least the national average in duration of T&O of 18 days.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Choi ◽  
Setthasorn Ooi ◽  
Eleanor Carpenter

Abstract Aims: Adequate exposure and teaching of Trauma and Orthopaedics (T&O) to medical students is fundamental in order to obtain sufficient knowledge and sustain their interest in T&O as a career. The primary aim is to assess the exposure and delivery of T&O at all medical schools in the UK. The secondary aim is to determine whether there are any associations between attending a particular medical school and having a strong interest in pursuing a career in T&O. Methods: To explore the primary aim, all 33 UK medical schools were investigated in the study, by means of a questionnaire distributed to medical students. This did not include ‘new’ medical schools, defined as those established from 2014 onwards. To investigate the secondary aim of exploring associations between students’ and alumni’s medical schools and their interest in T&O as a career, British Orthopaedic Training Association (BOTA) members were reviewed, using the General Medical Council register to identify the universities from which members had graduated. The authors have made the assumption that membership of BOTA signified an interest in T&O as a career. Results: Results were obtained for all 33 medical schools. The mean total teaching time specifically for T&O throughout medical school was 18 days, ranging from 3 to 60 days in total. 118 BOTA members were reviewed. No member of BOTA in the study had attended medical school in Keele, Liverpool, Plymouth or Lancashire. These universities taught below the national average number of days in T&O. Conclusions: There is a large national variance in the number of compulsory teaching days provided for T&O. The authors advocate medical schools to aim for at least the national average in duration of T&O of 18 days.


BJR|Open ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cindy Chew ◽  
Patrick J O'Dwyer ◽  
David Young

Objectives: The UK has a shortage of Radiologists to meet the increasing demand for radiologic examinations. To encourage more medical students to consider Radiology as a career, increased exposure at undergraduate level has been advocated. The aim of this study was to evaluate if formal Radiology teaching hours at medical school had any association with the number of qualified Radiologists joining the General Medical Council Specialist Register. Methods: Total number of doctors joining the GMC Specialist Register as Clinical Radiologists, and those with a primary medical qualifications awarded in Scotland, was obtained from the GMC (2010–2020). Graduate numbers from all 4 Scottish Medical Schools (2000–2011) were also obtained. Hours of Radiology teaching for medical schools in Scotland were obtained from validated AToMS study. Results: Two hundred and twenty three (6.6%) of 3347 Radiologists added to the GMC Specialist Register between 2010 and 2020 received their primary medical qualification (PMQ) from Scottish Universities. The number of Radiologists from Scottish Universities joining the GMC specialist register was 2.6% of the total number of Scottish Medical Graduates. There was no association between the number of hours (Range 1–30) Radiology was taught to medical students and the number that joined the specialist register as Radiologists (p = 0.54 chi square trend). Conclusion: Increased exposure to Radiology teaching does not influence medical students’ decision to take up Radiology as a career. While continued Radiology exposure remains important, other strategies are required in both the short and long term to ensure radiology services are maintained without detriment to patients. Advances in knowledge: Increased hours of Radiology teaching in medical school was not associated with increased radiologists joining the profession.


2021 ◽  
Vol 108 (Supplement_6) ◽  
Author(s):  
S M Choi ◽  
S Z Y Ooi ◽  
E C Carpenter

Abstract Aim Research has shown exposure to specialities as a medical student can have a great influence in choice of career. Exposure to potential mentors during this time also has an additive effect on career shaping of medical students. It is important to encourage interest in trauma and orthopaedics (T&O) to ensure the best candidates are selected. Our aim was to establish the compulsory duration of T&O teaching provided by all (non-new) medical schools. This study also aims to identify which other specialities were taught alongside T&O. Method Surveys were distributed to medical students in all 33 (non-new) medical schools, through surgical societies and colleagues met through courses, between June 2019- February 2020. The survey asked the total length of compulsory teaching of T&O in days, and how this was divided into pre-clinical or clinical teaching. Results Data for all 33 UK medical schools were collected. Only 7 medical schools taught T&O as a standalone subject. The other 26 medical schools combined T&O with other specialities, most commonly with Rheumatology (n = 16). The average total length of days of T&O teaching across medical school was 17 days (range 3-60). Majority of this teaching was given in the clinical years of medical school (n = 30). Conclusions Research has shown medical students require enough exposure to increase their interest in pursuing a particular speciality. Currently there is a huge variance on the number of compulsory teaching days for T&O.


2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 158-162 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Terry ◽  
Nancy Redfern ◽  
Gordon French

Trainee and established urologists are familiar with ‘generic mentoring’ as a potpourri of helping aids that include supervision, coaching, buddying, career advice, counselling and patronage to enable mentees to develop professionally. However, most are unfamiliar with ‘developmental mentoring’ as a highly specific learnt technique through which mentors help mentees, by interactive dialogue, to choose their own agendas and arrive at their own solutions to career/professional/personal opportunities or difficulties as distinct from the paternalistic mentor approach typified by the downward flow of information generated by ‘generic mentoring’. This paper is a systematic review of developmental mentoring as pertains to urologists in the UK, and reports outcomes of 1-hour taster sessions between Egan-trained mentors and urologists offered at British Association of Urological Surgeons (BAUS) annual general meetings since 2013. Both the General Medical Council and the Royal College of Surgeons of England imply that ‘mentoring’ is mandatory for both trainees and trained urologists, but fail to clarify what they mean by a ‘mentor’, which potentially creates a void in providing ‘developmental mentoring’ since the later requires specific training and is costly to provide. Currently, most ‘developmental mentoring’ is performed by trained staff in Local Education and Training Boards or National Health Service Trusts. BAUS has an opportunity to offer ‘developmental mentoring’ through a portal on its website to manage opportunities and difficulties experienced by its members. Level of evidence: This paper is a systematic review as pertains to the place of mentoring in current urological practice. By its nature, it has reviewed previous narrative reviews and its highest level of evidence is a contemporary paper from 2016, which was a comparative cross-sectional study; other case series were reviewed. Overall, this amounts to level 4 with a recommendation of C as per the Oxford Centre for Evidence-based Medicine Levels of Evidence.


2021 ◽  
Vol 94 (1119) ◽  
pp. 20201308
Author(s):  
Cindy Chew ◽  
Patrick J O'Dwyer ◽  
Euan Sandilands

Objective A recent study has shown that the averaged time tabled teaching for a medical student across 5 years in the UK was 4629 hours. Radiology has been demonstrated to be an excellent teaching source, yet the number of hours allocated to this has never been calculated. The aims of this study were to evaluate and quantify the hours allocated to radiology teaching in Scottish Medical Schools and to evaluate if they can fulfil requirements expected from other Clinical disciplines and the upcoming General Medical Council Medical Licensing Assessment (GMC MLA). Methods Data pertaining to timetabled teaching for Radiology in Scottish Universities were obtained from the authors of the Analysis of Teaching of Medical Schools (AToMS) survey. In addition, University Lead Clinician Teachers were surveyed on the radiological investigations and skills medical students should have at graduation. Results Medical students in Scottish Universities were allocated 59 h in Radiology (0.3%) out of a total 19,325 h of timetabled teaching. Hospital-based teaching was variable and ranged from 0 to 31 h. Almost half (15 of 31) of Clinician Teachers felt that there was insufficient radiology teaching in their specialty. Thirteen of 30 conditions included in the GMC MLA were listed by Clinician Teachers, while 23 others not listed by the GMC were considered important and cited by them. Conclusion This study demonstrates that medical students do not receive enough radiology teaching. This needs to be addressed by Universities in collaboration with the NHS in an effort to bring up this up to line with other developed countries and prepare students for the GMC MLA. Advances in knowledge (1) There is insufficient time allocated in Medical Students’ curriculum to Radiology. (2) Radiology teaching in medical schools fall short of University Lead Clinician Teachers’ and GMC expectations of medical students at graduation.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Hope ◽  
David Kluth ◽  
Matthew Homer ◽  
Avril Dewar ◽  
Richard Fuller ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Due to the diverse approaches to medical school assessment, making meaningful cross-school comparisons on knowledge is difficult. Ahead of the introduction of national licensing assessment in the UK, we evaluate schools on “common content” to compare candidates at different schools and evaluate whether they would pass under different standard setting regimes. Such information can then help develop a cross-school consensus on standard setting shared content. Methods We undertook a cross-sectional study in the academic sessions 2016-17 and 2017-18. Sixty “best of five” multiple choice items were delivered each year, with five used in both years. In 2016-17 30 (of 31 eligible) medical schools undertook a mean of 52.6 items with 7,177 participants. In 2017-18 the same 30 medical schools undertook a mean of 52.8 items with 7,165 participants for a full sample of 14,342 medical students sitting common content prior to graduation. Using mean scores, we compared performance across items and carried out a “like-for-like” comparison of schools who used the same set of items then modelled the impact of different passing standards on these schools. Results Schools varied substantially on candidate total score. Schools differed in their performance with large (Cohen’s d around 1) effects. A passing standard that would see 5% of candidates at high scoring schools fail left low-scoring schools with fail rates of up to 40%, whereas a passing standard that would see 5% of candidates at low scoring schools fail would see virtually no candidates from high scoring schools fail. Conclusions Candidates at different schools exhibited significant differences in scores in two separate sittings. Performance varied by enough that standard setting approaches that produce realistic fail rates in one medical school may produce substantially different pass rates in other medical schools – despite identical content and the candidates being governed by the same regulator. Regardless of which hypothetical standards are “correct” as judged by experts, large institutional gaps in pass rates must be explored and understood by medical educators before shared standards are applied. The study results can assist cross-school groups in developing a consensus on standard setting future licensing assessment.


2016 ◽  
Vol 102 (3) ◽  
pp. 5-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cathy Finnegan ◽  
Victoria Gauden

Professionalism is a concept at the heart of good medical practice. Ensuring that medical students develop and display professional behavior is crucial, both to ensure that their early encounters with patients are safe and appropriate, and to help guard against difficulties in their future practice. As part of its role as the UK's medical regulator, the General Medical Council (GMC) sets the standards that doctors need to follow as well as overseeing UK medical education and training. This includes providing guidance on student professional values and fitness to practice, which it does in partnership with the UK Medical Schools Council (MSC). To inform policy development in this area, the GMC carried out a survey of student professional values between December 2014 and January 2015. This article expands on and discusses a report about the survey, produced and published on the General Medical Council (GMC) website in 2015.1 The results of the survey are presented here. A total of 2,501 students responded to the survey, giving their views on the level of acceptability of 16 different scenarios. These results were analyzed by gender, year of study and entry route to medical school. While medical students responded overall in ways that indicate an understanding of professionalism, the results have highlighted some areas to focus improvements on, and differences between groups of students may be helpful to medical schools in planning how and when to teach certain aspects of professionalism.


1997 ◽  
Vol 90 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hagen Rampes ◽  
Fiona Sharples ◽  
Sarah Maragh ◽  
Peter Fisher

We surveyed the deans of British medical schools to determine the provision of complementary medicine in the undergraduate curriculum. We also sampled medical students at one British medical school to determine their knowledge of, and views on instruction in, complementary medicine. There is little education in complementary medicine at British medical schools, but it is an area of active curriculum development. Students' levels of knowledge vary widely between different therapies. Most medical students would like to learn about acupuncture, hypnosis, homoeopathy and osteopathy. We conclude that complementary medicine should be included in the medical undergraduate curriculum. This could be done without a great increase in teaching of facts, and could serve as a vehicle to introduce broader issues, as recommended by the General Medical Council.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raed Al-Taher ◽  
Ruba Al-Ani ◽  
Abdullah Al-Ani ◽  
Mohammad Rashdan ◽  
Abderrahman Manasrah ◽  
...  

Abstract Background: Elective course is one of 6th-year medical schools curriculum in Jordan. Students choose the specialty they wish to spend 8 weeks in and choose the place even if it is outside their universitys' affiliated hospitals. In this study, we try to understand students' choices regarding the country of elective, their specialty, type of placements (observership/ clerkship), and participants' perspectives about the elective course and its general value.Methods: Cross-sectional study. The survey distributed through social media platforms (mainly Facebook and Whatsapp) targeting 6th-year medical students and doctors who graduated from one of the 5 Jordanian medical schools (the University of Jordan, Jordan University of Science and Technology, Mutah University, Yarmouk University, Hashemite University). Results: The majority of participants had international elective (69.6%), mainly in the USA followed by the UK. Internal medicine was the field of interest for 14.8%, followed by general surgery 11.2%. 241 (62.6%) actively participated in the elective as they had a clerkship/ hands-on experience. In contrast, 142 (36.9%) were observers. The majority indicated that the elective is worth time, money, and effort. Moreover, they had adequate supervision throughout the course and could achieve their preset objectives. Conclusions: the elective course gives a unique experience to our students. The general satisfaction is an indicator of the success of the course in exposing medical students to clinical practice actively.


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