Posted in Main | 14/11/2009
Our study reveals that the most important factors in choosing a particular internal medicine residency program are similar for all applicants and reflect the program location and characteristics of the program, such as good house staff morale, academic reputation and variety of clinical experiences provided. Although location characteristics are fixed, our study suggests there are several factors that a program may improve or emphasize to make their residency more attractive to applicants. The most important of these appears to be creating a positive environment that reflects good house staff morale and a positive, rather than competitive, interview experience. In addition, applicants are looking for a program with a diversity of clinical experiences. Program directors should emphasize the variety of hospitals, clinics and specialty rotations available to their residency applicants and expand such opportunities if not already available. Although these findings may seem intuitive, there are no previously published empiric data…
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Posted in Main | 13/11/2009
Of the 2,908 students to whom a survey was sent, 88 surveys were returned for insufficient address, resulting in a total of 2,820 surveys presumably received by students. A total of 1,043 students returned completed questionnaires, for a response rate of 37%. Of these respondents, 38 were IMG and were excluded from all analyses. Another eight respondents did not indicate their gender and were not included in the analysis. The demographic characteristics of the respondents are presented in Table 1. No information was available on the demographic characteristics of nonrespondents due to the confidentiality of the NRMP list.
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Posted in Main | 12/11/2009
Participants and Study Design We performed a cross-sectional survey of fourth-year medical students applying during the 1999 National Residency Matching Plan (NRMP) in internal medicine. Potential participants were chosen from the lists of all medical students applying for placement in one or more of four internal medicine residency programs, including the University of California-San Francisco, University of California-Los Angeles, Massachusetts General Hospital,and New York Presbyterian Hospital. These four institutions were selected because of similar quality, and thus, would be expected to attract a similar pool of applicants.
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Posted in Main | 11/11/2009
INTRODUCTION Selection and recruitment of qualified medical school graduates is a major concern of internal medicine residency directors and faculty at teaching institutions. The process of residency program selection is highly competitive, particularly with regard to top-ranked applicants. Highly qualified underrepresent-ed minority (URM) applicants represent an ever-smaller proportion of candidates for residency programs. This is true despite the fact that minority populations are the fastest-growing segment of the U.S. population. According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s projections, African Americans, Latinos, American Indians/Alaskan Natives and Asians, which made up nearly 30% of the U.S. population in 2000, will comprise 47.2% by the year 2050. Despite the overall demographic changes in the United States, a decrease in URM applicants of 7.1% was noted from 1996 to 1997, such that minority applicants represented only 11% of the entire applicant pool to medical school. Much of this decrease may be attributed to changes in…
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Posted in Health | 10/11/2009
The principle purpose of the study was to ascertain if there was an association between satisfaction with healthcare, provider cultural competency and participation in healthcare research. Clinical investigators at CUMC were concerned with the low participation of ethnic minorities in healthcare research in the Omaha community, they asked the Office of Health Sciences: Multicultural and Community Affairs to explore the reason.
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Posted in Health | 09/11/2009
Findings Minority community members are not satisfied with their healthcare. This hypothesis is not supported by our data. Only nine respondents (11.3%) reported dissatisfaction, six with care provided by the physician and four the nurse. One of the nine was dissatisfied with both the physician and nurse (Tables 5 and 6). The overwhelming majority of our respondents were satisfied with care they received. When these same respondents were asked if they would go to the same healthcare provider the next time they became ill, 66 or 83% said yes. Only seven respondents said they would want to see a different provider (Table 7). Although nine respondents were dissatisfied with doctor and/or nursing care, only seven said they would not go to the same provider again. All of the ethnic and racial groups were represented in the dissatisfaction with provider except for the Vietnamese and white group. And yet of the…
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Posted in Health | 08/11/2009
Demographic Information Table 1 provides us with the ethnic/racial and gender background of the 80 respondents. The sample was 43.8% male and 55% female. One respondent did not indicate his/her gender. Table 2 shows that 51.3% of the sample was married but that none of the African Americans were married. The data also indicated that more females than males were married.
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