Problems of postgraduate education and self-education of rehabilitation physicians

Abstract

he problems of the postgraduate education of medical practitioners are considered through the prism of sociological views regarding the acceleration of increasingly complex society. A total number of 1586 rehabilitation specialists from all Russian regions were interviewed during the VI International Congress “Neurorehabilitation” that took place in Moscow in June 2014. The results show that the physicians are not well oriented in the evaluation of the sources of self-education and professional training (given that there is motivation for that). The respondents demonstrate poor attention to the sources they chose; they fail to name correctly at least one recently read article devoted to the topic they are interested in. According to respondents, the best way to improve professional skills is to participate in foreign internship program; fewer respondents opt for studying educational materials and monographs (self-education), participating in state-run training courses, or listening to the lectures at national and foreign congresses. Private courses do not inspire confidence; the information provided by social media including special medical resources (such as “Doktor na rabote”, “Vrachi RF”) is recognized to be least valuable. Many respondents mention difficulties concerning their inclusion in effective postgraduate education due to problems of enrollment, high price of courses, obstacles put by the administration and lack of desire. The interpretation of answers as signs of simplification of social practices (constant professional training) allow assessing the current processes in a new way (establishing professional associations such as Union of Rehabilitologists of Russia, experimental parascientific schools, introduction of state standards et cet). The studied phenomena can be compared with the characteristics typical for the concept of social acceleration (self-organization, self-analysis or fragmentation of professional community forced by the introduction of new standards or professional profile). The possible ways to tackle the problems in the medical training is to improve the standardization of the postgraduate education, to preserve and develop the “degree of liberty” with regard to the compulsory elements of the education and self-education, and to prevent the dehumanization of the system. The authors cite an example of the renewed practice used in the experiment which is in process.