An Innovative Seven-year Physician Scientist Residency Training Program That Addresses the Shortage of Academic Surgeons

Due to the declining number of scientifi cally trained physicians and increasing demand for high-quality literature, our institution pioneered a seven-year Physician Scientist Training Program (PSTP) to provide research-oriented residents the knowledge and skills for a successful academic career. The present study sought to identify orthopaedic surgeons with MD/PhD degrees, residency programs with dedicated research tracks, and to assess the eff ectiveness of the novel seven-year program in training prospective academic orthopaedic surgeons. Surgeons with MD/PhD degrees account for 2.3% of all 3,408 orthopaedic faculty positions in U.S. residency programs. During the last 23 years, our PSTP residents produced 752 peer-reviewed publications and received $349,354 from 23 resident-authored extramural grants. Eleven of our seven-year alumni practice orthopaedic surgery in an academic sett ing. The seven-year PSTP successfully develops clinically trained surgeon scientists with refi ned skills in basic science and clinical experimental design, grant proposals, scientifi c presentations, and manuscript preparation. (Journal of Surgical Orthopaedic Advances 31(3):144–149, 2022)

Key words: resident education, basic science, academic faculty