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CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 · Indian J Plast Surg 2021; 54(03): 251-252
DOI: 10.1055/s-0041-1739031
Editorial

Surgical Residents Preference for Plastic Surgery Specialty

Dinesh Kadam
1   Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, A. J. Institute of Medical Sciences and Research Centre, Mangalore, Karnataka, India
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A career in plastic surgery is flexible, promising, and prosperous. Despite its vast scope and versatility, its impact on student’s interests is not optimum. Few superspecialty courses continue to draw the aspirants and remain high-priority branches. Last year, 20 to 25% of M.Ch applicants opted for surgical gastroenterology, oncosurgery, and urology, 10% for plastic and neurosurgery, and 5% for cardiothoracic vascular surgery (CTVS) and pediatric surgery.[1] The demand for some specialties has also been declining over the past few years for various reasons. Particularly in CTVS and pediatric surgery, as many as 70 and 40% of the seats were vacant in 2019.[2] [3] This attrition is alarming which is further compounded by the drawbacks of restricted eligibility criteria of NEET Super-specialty.[1] The situation is not so dire for plastic surgery; nevertheless, despite the varied career options it provides, only 10% of of candidates prefer plastic surgery is concerning and calls for critical appraisal and remedial steps. The specialty certainly deserves a good pool of worthy and avid aspirants to develop a robust force of future plastic surgeons. There is a distinct gap between reality and perception among the residents about the specialty. All impediments, stereotypes, and biases enveloping the specialty must be eliminated. It is our collective responsibility to effect the change among the fraternity, students, and society.



Publication History

Article published online:
13 October 2021

© 2021. Association of Plastic Surgeons of India. This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonDerivative-NonCommercial-License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit. Contents may not be used for commercial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

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