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Specialty preferences among final year medical students in medical schools of southeast Nigeria: need for career guidance
BACKGROUND: In resource-poor settings with low doctor-population ratio, there is need for equitable distribution of healthcare workforce. The specialty preferences of medical students determine the future composition of physician workforce hence its relevance in career guidance, healthcare planning...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
BioMed Central
2016
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5050581/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27716155 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12909-016-0781-3 |
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author | Ossai, Edmund Ndudi Uwakwe, Kenechi Anderson Anyanwagu, Uchenna Chidi Ibiok, Ntat Charles Azuogu, Benedict Ndubueze Ekeke, Ngozi |
author_facet | Ossai, Edmund Ndudi Uwakwe, Kenechi Anderson Anyanwagu, Uchenna Chidi Ibiok, Ntat Charles Azuogu, Benedict Ndubueze Ekeke, Ngozi |
author_sort | Ossai, Edmund Ndudi |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: In resource-poor settings with low doctor-population ratio, there is need for equitable distribution of healthcare workforce. The specialty preferences of medical students determine the future composition of physician workforce hence its relevance in career guidance, healthcare planning and policy formulation. This study was aimed at determining the specialty preferences of final year medical students in medical schools of southeast Nigeria, the gender differences in choice of specialty and the availability of career guidance to the students during the period of training. METHODS: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among final year medical students in the six accredited medical schools in southeast Nigeria using self-administered semi-structured questionnaire. Information on reason for studying Medicine, specialty preference and career guidance were obtained. Chi-square test of statistical significance was used in the analysis. RESULTS: A total of 457 students participated in the study with a response rate of 86.7 %. The mean age was 25.5 ± 2.9 years and 57.1 % were male. Majority (51 %) opted to study Medicine in-order to save lives while 89.5 % intended to pursue postgraduate medical training. A higher proportion (51.8 %) made the decision during the period of clinical rotation. The five most preferred specialties among the students were Surgery (24.0 %); Paediatrics (18.8 %); Obstetrics and Gynaecology (15.6 %); Internal Medicine (11.0 %) and Community Medicine (6.8 %) while Pathology (2.0 %); Anaesthesia (0.7 %) and Ear, Nose and Throat (0.2 %), were the least preferred. Compared to females, a higher proportion of male students intended to specialise in Surgery (32.3 % vs 13.0 %, p < 0.001) in contrast to Paediatrics (11.2 % vs 28.8 %, p < 0.001). Majority of the students, 74.6 % had no form of career guidance during their stay in medical school and 11.2 % were undecided on choice of specialty. CONCLUSION: In spite of the high proportion of students willing to pursue specialist medical training after graduation, most opted for the four core clinical specialities of Surgery, Paediatrics, Obstetrics and Gynaecology and Internal Medicine. Majority of the students made these decisions during clinical rotations. Also, majority had no form of career guidance throughout their stay in medical school. To ensure an equitable distribution of a limited physician workforce in a resource-poor setting, there is need for proper career guidance for the students and this should be in line with the national health needs. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12909-016-0781-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-5050581 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2016 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-50505812016-10-06 Specialty preferences among final year medical students in medical schools of southeast Nigeria: need for career guidance Ossai, Edmund Ndudi Uwakwe, Kenechi Anderson Anyanwagu, Uchenna Chidi Ibiok, Ntat Charles Azuogu, Benedict Ndubueze Ekeke, Ngozi BMC Med Educ Research Article BACKGROUND: In resource-poor settings with low doctor-population ratio, there is need for equitable distribution of healthcare workforce. The specialty preferences of medical students determine the future composition of physician workforce hence its relevance in career guidance, healthcare planning and policy formulation. This study was aimed at determining the specialty preferences of final year medical students in medical schools of southeast Nigeria, the gender differences in choice of specialty and the availability of career guidance to the students during the period of training. METHODS: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among final year medical students in the six accredited medical schools in southeast Nigeria using self-administered semi-structured questionnaire. Information on reason for studying Medicine, specialty preference and career guidance were obtained. Chi-square test of statistical significance was used in the analysis. RESULTS: A total of 457 students participated in the study with a response rate of 86.7 %. The mean age was 25.5 ± 2.9 years and 57.1 % were male. Majority (51 %) opted to study Medicine in-order to save lives while 89.5 % intended to pursue postgraduate medical training. A higher proportion (51.8 %) made the decision during the period of clinical rotation. The five most preferred specialties among the students were Surgery (24.0 %); Paediatrics (18.8 %); Obstetrics and Gynaecology (15.6 %); Internal Medicine (11.0 %) and Community Medicine (6.8 %) while Pathology (2.0 %); Anaesthesia (0.7 %) and Ear, Nose and Throat (0.2 %), were the least preferred. Compared to females, a higher proportion of male students intended to specialise in Surgery (32.3 % vs 13.0 %, p < 0.001) in contrast to Paediatrics (11.2 % vs 28.8 %, p < 0.001). Majority of the students, 74.6 % had no form of career guidance during their stay in medical school and 11.2 % were undecided on choice of specialty. CONCLUSION: In spite of the high proportion of students willing to pursue specialist medical training after graduation, most opted for the four core clinical specialities of Surgery, Paediatrics, Obstetrics and Gynaecology and Internal Medicine. Majority of the students made these decisions during clinical rotations. Also, majority had no form of career guidance throughout their stay in medical school. To ensure an equitable distribution of a limited physician workforce in a resource-poor setting, there is need for proper career guidance for the students and this should be in line with the national health needs. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12909-016-0781-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. BioMed Central 2016-10-04 /pmc/articles/PMC5050581/ /pubmed/27716155 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12909-016-0781-3 Text en © The Author(s). 2016 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Ossai, Edmund Ndudi Uwakwe, Kenechi Anderson Anyanwagu, Uchenna Chidi Ibiok, Ntat Charles Azuogu, Benedict Ndubueze Ekeke, Ngozi Specialty preferences among final year medical students in medical schools of southeast Nigeria: need for career guidance |
title | Specialty preferences among final year medical students in medical schools of southeast Nigeria: need for career guidance |
title_full | Specialty preferences among final year medical students in medical schools of southeast Nigeria: need for career guidance |
title_fullStr | Specialty preferences among final year medical students in medical schools of southeast Nigeria: need for career guidance |
title_full_unstemmed | Specialty preferences among final year medical students in medical schools of southeast Nigeria: need for career guidance |
title_short | Specialty preferences among final year medical students in medical schools of southeast Nigeria: need for career guidance |
title_sort | specialty preferences among final year medical students in medical schools of southeast nigeria: need for career guidance |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5050581/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27716155 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12909-016-0781-3 |
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