School of Medicine, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama.
College of Medicine, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, South Carolina.
J Surg Res. 2020 Nov;255:96-98. doi: 10.1016/j.jss.2020.05.049. Epub 2020 May 21.
The COVID-19 pandemic has presented a variety of challenges in the medical education curriculum, one of which is the possible loss of summer and fall away rotations for fourth year students applying into surgical subspecialties. Subsequently, a lack of in-person evaluations may have a major impact on an applicant's perception of the residency and the program's ability to assess the individual applicant. This is especially crucial for applicants without a home program in their specialty of interest, as away rotations are an important opportunity to confirm interest in pursuit of a subspecialty, obtain letters of recommendation, and make positive impressions at programs of interest. The objective of this article is to assess the current COVID-19 pandemic situation in light of away rotations and to provide recommendations for surgical subspecialty programs and applicants to have the best outcome during this upcoming application cycle. In particular, we emphasize the importance of implementing universal processes within each individual subspecialty. This will provide equitable opportunities for all applicants, minimizing potential biases or disadvantages based on geographic location or availability of a program at an applicant's home institution.
COVID-19 大流行给医学教育课程带来了各种挑战，其中之一是申请外科亚专业的四年级学生可能会错过暑期和秋季的实习轮转。因此，缺乏面对面评估可能会对申请人对住院医师的看法以及该计划评估个人申请人的能力产生重大影响。对于没有本专业实习医院的申请人来说，这一点尤为关键，因为实习轮转是确认对追求亚专业的兴趣、获得推荐信以及在感兴趣的项目中留下积极印象的重要机会。本文的目的是评估当前 COVID-19 大流行情况下的实习轮转情况，并为外科亚专业项目和申请人提供建议，以在即将到来的申请周期中取得最佳结果。特别是，我们强调在每个亚专业中实施通用流程的重要性。这将为所有申请人提供公平的机会，最大限度地减少基于地理位置或申请人所在机构的项目可用性而产生的潜在偏见或劣势。
