Characterizing the social media footprint of general surgery residency programs.
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ABSTRACT: Background
The medical community has increasingly embraced social media for a variety of purposes, including trainee education, research dissemination, professional networking, and recruitment of trainees and faculty. Platform choice and usage patterns appear to vary by specialty and purpose, but few studies comprehensively assess programs' social media presence. Prior studies assessed general surgery departments' Twitter use but omitted additional social media platforms and residency-specific accounts.Objective
This study sought to broadly characterize the social media footprint of U.S. general surgery residency programs.Methods
Using a protocolized search of program websites, social media platforms (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn), and internet search, cross-sectional data on social media usage in March 2020 were collected for programs, their affiliated departments, their program directors (PDs), and their assistant/associate PDs (APDs).Results
318 general surgery residency programs, 313 PDs, and 296 APDs were identified. 47.2% of programs had surgery-specific accounts on ≥1 platform. 40.2% of PDs and APDs had ≥1 account on Twitter and/or LinkedIn. Program type was associated with social media adoption and Twitter utilization, with lower usage among university-affiliated and independent programs (p<0.01).Conclusions
Most general surgery residencies, especially non-university-based programs, lacked any department or residency accounts across Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram by March 2020. These findings highlight opportunities for increased social media engagement and act as a pre-pandemic baseline for future investigations of how the shift to virtual trainee education, recruitment, conferences, and clinical care affect social media use.
SUBMITTER: White EM
PROVIDER: S-EPMC8244871 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
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Project description:BackgroundWith increasing public awareness of and greater coverage for gender-confirming surgery by insurers, more transgender patients are likely to seek surgical transition. The degree to which plastic surgery and urology trainees are prepared to treat transgender patients is unknown.ObjectiveWe assessed the number of hours dedicated to transgender-oriented education in plastic surgery and urology residencies, and the impact of program director (PD) attitudes on provision of such training.MethodsPDs of all Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education-accredited plastic surgery (91) and urology (128) programs were invited to participate. Surveys were completed between November 2015 and March 2016; responses were collected and analyzed.ResultsIn total, 154 PDs (70%) responded, and 145 (66%) completed the survey, reporting a yearly median of 1 didactic hour and 2 clinical hours of transgender content. Eighteen percent (13 of 71) of plastic surgery and 42% (31 of 74) of urology programs offered no didactic education, and 34% (24 of 71) and 30% (22 of 74) provided no clinical exposure, respectively. PDs of programs located in the southern United States were more likely to rate transgender education as unimportant or neutral (23 of 37 [62%] versus 39 of 105 [37%]; P = .017). PDs who rated transgender education as important provided more hours of didactic content (median, 1 versus 0.75 hours; P = .001) and clinical content (median, 5 versus 0 hours; P < .001).ConclusionsA substantial proportion of plastic surgery and urology residencies provide no education on transgender health topics, and those that do, provide variable content. PD attitudes toward transgender-specific education appear to influence provision of training.
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