Hospital training is considered to correspond best with practical work

Backround  Medical education is constantly being developed and it is therefore important to follow how the changes affect satisfaction with education. The objective of this study was to examine how well physicians consider medical education to match with their work and how satisfied they are with their medical education.

Methods  This study was based on the Physician 2018 Survey, which is a part of a study series repeated every five years. A questionnaire was sent to Finnish physicians born on even years and under the age of 70 (n=11,336). There were 5,187 respondents (46%). Those who had graduated during the years 2007­–2018 were included in the study.

Results  Out of all the respondents, 86 % reported that their medical education well or decently well matched with their practical work. Correspondence with hospital training was as good as it had been in earlier surveys. Correspondence with primary health care centre training was lower than with hospital training.

Conclusions  Finnish physicians considered that correspondence of medical education principally matched with physician’s work. Most of the time in clinical training takes place in a hospital environment which may explain the higher level of correspondence with hospital work. Correspondence with primary health care centre training varied. Developing convergent teaching methods would be important in the future. The definition of common learning goals in all five medical faculties has been a good step towards this.

Elina Korkiakoski, Sami Heistaro, Pyry Mattila, Markku Sumanen