Feasibility of implementing a surgical student internship program in South Korea

PURPOSE Despite recommendations for introducing student internships (SI) in undergraduate medical education in Korea, the feasibility of surgical SIs has not been demonstrated in the Korean context. We thus identified tasks that could be performed by surgical student interns in a Korean education hospital. METHODS The opinions of surgery clerkship directors of medical schools nationwide, regarding the tasks, symptoms and signs, disease entities, and procedures that student interns could perform in their hospitals, were subjected to descriptive analysis. RESULTS Out of the 41 medical schools in Korea, 32 responded. Five implemented an optimal-quality SI program. Two schools considered third-year clerkship as SI. The respondents replied that student interns could be involved in basic nonspecific tasks such as history taking, physical examination, medial recording, reporting patients' status, and assisting during surgery. However, more surgery-specific tasks such as perioperative management or caring for a patient with acute abdominal pain were considered difficult for student interns to encounter in the Korean context. CONCLUSION Surgical educators should determine a specific role for student interns and encourage them to perform surgery-specific tasks. We recommend societal and system support, and curriculum renovation to establish an SI program in Korea.