Original Research

Surveying the Current State of International Outreach in Radiology Training Programs

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Abstract

Purpose: Over the past decade, there has been an increased level of attention focused on improving radiology’s contributions to global health programs in resource-restricted areas of the world. This has led to the formation of new organizations and international imaging partnerships. As a result, there have been related publications and guidelines, which has increased awareness and interest amongst current and prospective radiology trainees.

Methods and Materials: With this survey of residency program directors, we set out to: 1) examine current opinions of and experience with integrating international and outreach opportunities into their training curriculum; and 2) to analyze these data to inform strategies for growing opportunities within training programs nationwide.

Results: The majority (51%) of programs participating in the survey have interest in participating in international projects and 64% feel they add value to resident education. Only about a quarter (27%) of programs, however, have had residents participate in radiology-related international projects over the last five years, and even fewer (18.8%) have established international elective opportunities. However, the majority of programs (58.3%) have some faculty who are involved in international radiology.

Conclusion: The reported interest in international educational and service opportunities among residency training programs is much greater than current levels of participation. A much larger percentage of responding programs have faculty involved in international work than residents, despite the acknowledged benefits and interest

Keywords: International, global health, global radiology, residency, outreach, survey

How to Cite:

Johnson, B., Kapalczynski, W., Streicher, D., Chou, H., Stewart, J., Ali, N., Gupta, S., Gagne, S. M. & Huff, M. W., (2018) “Surveying the Current State of International Outreach in Radiology Training Programs”, Journal of Global Radiology 4(1): 3. doi: https://doi.org/10.7191/jgr.2018.1052

Rights: © 2018 the Author(s). This open access article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).