Are there differences between SIMG surgeons and locally trained surgeons in Australia and New Zealand, as rated by colleagues and themselves?

BACKGROUND: Representation of specialist international medical graduates (SIMGs) in specific specialties such as surgery can be expected to grow as doctor shortages are predicted in the context of additional care provision for aging populations and limited local supply. Many national medical boards and colleges provide pathways for medical registration and fellowship of SIMGs that may include examinations and short-term training. There is currently very little understanding of how SIMGs are perceived by colleagues and whether their performance is perceived to be comparable to locally trained medical specialists. It is also not known how SIMGs perceive their own capabilities in comparison to local specialists. The aim of this study is to explore the relationships between colleague feedback and self-evaluation in the specialist area of surgery to identify possible methods for enhancing registration and follow-up training within the jurisdiction of Australia and New Zealand. METHODS: Feedback from 1728 colleagues to 96 SIMG surgeons and 406 colleagues to 25 locally trained Fellow surgeons was collected, resulting in 2134 responses to 121 surgeons in total. Additionally, 98 SIMGs and 25 Fellows provided self-evaluation scores (123 in total). Questionnaire and data reliability were calculated before analysis of variance, principal component analysis and network analysis were performed to identify differences between colleague evaluations and self-evaluations by surgeon type. RESULTS: Colleagues rated SIMGs and Fellows in the ‘very good’ to ‘excellent’ range. Fellows received a small but statistically significant higher average score than SIMGs, especially in areas dealing with medical skills and expertise. However, SIMGs received higher scores where there was motivation to demonstrate working well with colleagues. Colleagues rated SIMGs using one dimension and Fellows using three, which can be identified as clinical management skills, inter-personal communication skills and self-management skills. On self-evaluation, both SIMGs and Fellows gave themselves a significant lower average score than their colleagues, with SIMGs giving themselves a statistically significant higher score than Fellows. CONCLUSIONS: Colleagues rate SIMGs and Fellows highly. The results of this study indicate that SIMGs tend to self-assess more highly, but according to colleagues do not display the same level of differentiation between clinical management, inter-personal and self-management skills. Further research is required to confirm these provisional findings and possible reasons for lack of differentiation if this exists. Depending on the outcome, possible support mechanisms can be explored that may lead to increased comparable performance with locally trained graduates of Australia and New Zealand in these three dimensions. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12909-022-03560-y.