You may be familiar with this reference. Even though I have heard it mentioned, this is the first time I actually ran across it.
Kamien, M. (1996). "A comparison of medical student experiences in rural specialty and metropolitan teaching hospital practice." Aust J Rural Health 4(3): 151-8.
One factor in solving the rural medical workforce shortage is to foster student interest by greater exposure to rural medicine. However, many medical school teachers are concerned that this may cause students to be disadvantaged by missing core lectures, tutorials and ward rounds in the setting of the high quality of teaching hospital medicine. This paper compares the rural specialty experience of 28 fifth-year volunteers with 28 'pairs' who remained in the city teaching hospitals.
Rural students saw double the number of medical conditions, assisted in or performed six times as many procedures, and all but three students were sure that they had a better educational experience than their city counterparts. This is a strong academic argument for greater medical student exposure to rural specialty practice.
tom
"Thomas Rosenthal, MD"
Thanks Tom
Our compliments to those who do so much for so long and for so little. Regarding the impact of rural exposure to those in urban programs:
My research demonstrated that required rural months increased the rural graduation rates of FP programs. In breakdowns by urban categories, even the most urban programs had better rural graduation rates with rural rotations.
James Rourke in Canada has had experience in supervising such rotations in a number of specialties across a region. Why should FP folks be the only ones to share the fun and the experiences. This is even more important given the reductions in teaching time and priorities in academic centers and the impact of liability and the worsening continuity. If we did not have rural comparisons, innovative programs, and comparisons with Canada, we would not know just how far medical education in the US has slipped. RCB