Abstract
INTRODUCTION: In 2004, a shortage of burn surgeons was cited in the literature, motivating the burn surgery community to improve recruitment and retention of burn surgeons. The authors sought to analyze the awareness of burn surgery at our institution to determine how KUMC medical students’ understanding of burn surgery compares to other populations. METHODS: A survey was disseminated to students and allowed respondents to indicate their level of knowledge and interest in the field of burn surgery. RESULTS: Responses indicate that 64% don’t know enough about burn surgery to consider it a career; 77% of students would attend burn surgery educational events, 4.5% of students in their final year of school agreed to this statement. 69% agree they would be more likely to choose burn surgery with the help of a mentor and 68% agree they would be more likely to choose burn surgery if exposed to it earlier. CONCLUSIONS: Analysis confirmed that there is not a difference in the level of knowledge based on year in school, suggesting that students in the later years of their education have not had enough exposure to burn surgery. The lack of interest demonstrated by M4s supports our hypothesis that earlier exposure to burn surgery will be most beneficial. The positive response regarding interest in learning more about burn surgery provides evidence to move forward with this research. A survey of students from another institution will increase our findings’ power and support the goal of creating online educational resources available to students.