4.4 Interventions in Medical Education
Although only a limited number of articles were published describing the
effects of simulation (19, 23), conferences/careers day (25), workshops
(26), and modified curriculum amongst medical students and trainees
(27), they all showed that these interventions provided a means of
networking and developing surgical skills. Students and junior doctors
were immersed in a surgical environment and this influenced their
decisions on career choice to a certain extent. Seminars and mentors
provide a more realistic view on workload and lifestyle, again striving
to remove students from the shielded environment of medical school as
mentioned previously (13, 31). These simulations are a form of exposure.
Therefore, the ability to determine the optimal duration of the
intervention and to track the results of surgical clerkships is vital in
order to develop these programmes, as this will be the ultimate
assessment of success.
Modifying existing anatomy curricula may not significantly affect the
results during examination but it improved students’ opinions of
surgeons (27) and may instill surgical interest amongst medical students
at an earlier stage. Indeed, this may result in a more holistic
environment in medical education where students are exposed to both
medical and surgical environments from their first year which perhaps
may lead to changing perceptions of surgery and ultimately a career in
niche fields like CT surgery.
Incentives such as scholarship awards provide the required opportunities
to get involved in CT surgery-related research and inevitably maintain
interest in the field over long periods of time as students have the
benefit of gaining a mentor, whilst working together (9).
There will be challenges in implementing such changes in current medical
school curricula due to the difficulties in making any improvements from
feedback obtained by a small class and identifying the feasibility of
involving a larger number of students in workshops and simulations. This
is reflected in the studies exploring these interventions as their
sample sizes were small (n < 100). This could potentially be
addressed by allowing students to rotate between the different surgical
workshops throughout the year in small groups as they would in placement
blocks. Incorporating surgical teaching in every clinical year in
medical school may also allow for more opportunities in witnessing
clinical cases such as CT surgery procedures and taking part in any
organised surgical simulation or seminars regarding CT surgery.