Education Research [291–300]

• Published in: Rheumatology (Oxford, England) England), 2010-04, Vol.49 (suppl-1), p.i143-i147
• Main Authors: Thapper, Muryum, Roussou, Euthalia, Jandial, Sharmila, Pearson, John, Foster, Helen E., Thompson, Ben, Orr, Jennifer, Platt, Phil, Birrell, Fraser, Sritharan, Meera, Croft, Adam, Justice, Elizabeth, Carruthers, David, Walker, David, Robinson, Sandra, Jagatsinh, Yogen, Adebajo, Ade, Helliwell, Phil, Rahman, Anisur, Shah, P., Snowden, N., Dexter, H., Dornan, T., Singh, Deepwant, Meadows, Anne, Frusher, Jill, Sampson, Claire, Sheehan, Nicholas J., Dahiya, Sandeep, Croft, Adam P., Justice, Elizabeth A., Carruthers, David M., Little, Jayne, Melath, Sunil, Procter, Sarah, Horne, Zoey, Lauder, Alison, McCabe, Candida, Rodham, Karen
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 1462-0324; 1462-0332
• DOI: 10.1093/rheumatology/keq732

Background: Current Rheumatological training for junior doctors in UK is variable during medical school and limited at SpR level. Aiming to assess medical students exposure to Rheumatology during medical school and their perception of rheumatology training at FY1 and FY2 level, an online survey was conducted which was designed and distributed via www.surveymonkey.com to all (31) UK medical schools through e-mail to educational directors. Methods: The questionnaire addressed to 4th, 5th and 6th (where existed) year medical students had 10 questions; 5 questions were related to demographics and 5 focused upon undergraduate exposure to Rheumatology and student’s perception of undertaking rheumatological training as part of their foundation years rotations. The questionnaire was piloted for 2 weeks at Bart’s and the London, before being distributed electronically. Following piloting, amendments were made to the questionnaire. The survey was available online as a web-link which was active over two months (from mid-August to mid-October 2009). Results: A total of 254 medical students replied from 11 different medical schools, out of a total 31 across the UK. These were: London (Bart's and the London (35.8%), Imperial College, St George’s), Oxford (17.3%), Dundee (16.9%), Leicester (10.6%), Bristol (9.8%), East Anglia, Leeds, Hull York and Sheffield. The majority (92.9%) belonged to the 22–28 age group. They were 177 females and 77 males (2.2:1). The majority (59.8%) were in 5th year, (5.9% year 6) and 89.4% were undergraduates while 10.6% were graduate entry programme (GEP) students. One-fifth (20.9%) of those who replied had received no exposure at all in Rheumatology. Most (61.4%) had 3 weeks exposure and 13.4% had 6 weeks. Interestingly few medical schools offer 9 and 12 weeks exposure. Nearly half of the medical students (47.2%) would like to do rheumatology as part of their FY1/FY2 rotation and 44.9% would like to have more FY1/FY2 posts available in rheumatology. However, when asked to choose six specialties most useful for FY1/FY2 training, from a total of 21, the top 6 preferred by most students were: acute medicine (76%), emergency medicine (66.9%), surgery (53.9%), general practice (48.8%), cardiology (47.6%) and paediatrics (46.9%). Rheumatology was amongst the bottom 3 specialties, attracting only 9.4% followed by oncology (8.3%) and ophthalmology (7.1%). Conclusions: There is great variability in the undergraduate rheumatology teaching across the UK