Abstract
ObjectivesTo assess awareness and knowledge of Interventional Radiology (IR) in a large population of medical students in 2019.MethodsAn anonymous survey was distributed electronically to 9546 medical students from first to sixth year at three European medical schools. The survey contained 14 questions, including two general questions on diagnostic radiology (DR) and artificial intelligence (AI), and 11 on IR. Responses were analyzed for all students and compared between preclinical (PCs) (first to third year) and clinical phase (Cs) (fourth to sixth year) of medical school. Of 9546 students, 1459 students (15.3%) answered the survey.ResultsOn DR questions, 34.8% answered that AI is a threat for radiologists (PCs: 246/725 (33.9%); Cs: 248/734 (36%)) and 91.1% thought that radiology has a future (PCs: 668/725 (92.1%); Cs: 657/734 (89.5%)). On IR questions, 80.8% (1179/1459) students had already heard of IR; 75.7% (1104/1459) stated that their knowledge of IR wasn’t as good as the other specialties and 80% would like more lectures on IR. Finally, 24.2% (353/1459) indicated an interest in a career in IR with a majority of women in preclinical phase, but this trend reverses in clinical phase.ConclusionsDevelopment of new technology supporting advances in artificial intelligence will likely continue to change the landscape of radiology; however, medical students remain confident in the need for specialty-trained human physicians in the future of radiology as a clinical practice. A large majority of medical students would like more information about IR in their medical curriculum; almost a quarter of students would be interested in a career in IR.
Highlights
Radiology has long been a very attractive specialty, widely chosen by medical students in the first preference specialties for residency
A large majority of medical students would like more information/lectures about Interventional radiology in their medical curriculum; almost a quarter of students would be interested in a career in IR, which is very promising for the future of this specialty
The distribution of the students shows that 26% were in the first year, 11% in the second year, 13% in the third year, 14% in the fourth year, 16% in the fifth year and 20% in the sixth year, with a gender ratio M/F of 2/3: 37.4% were male and 63.6% were female
Summary
Radiology has long been a very attractive specialty, widely chosen by medical students in the first preference specialties for residency. Auloge et al Insights Imaging (2020) 11:127 aspect of patient care, enabling more accurate diagnoses more quickly, and assessment of the effects of treatments, to support effective treatment management. In recent years, technological innovations supporting the development of artificial intelligence and teleradiology have generated speculation about the future of radiology, both diagnostic and interventional, and raised doubts about the longer-term viability as a clinical practice. As a large teaching institution, we wanted to assess students’ thoughts about the future of radiology and how they perceive artificial intelligence and its role vis-à-vis radiology. We wanted to determine the awareness and knowledge of IR among medical students at different phases of their study
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