Background/Purpose: Based on data from the 2005 Rheumatology Workforce Study the demand for rheumatologists will continue to increase in the coming decades. Demand for rheumatologists outstrips the current supply of trained rheumatologists. The American College of Rheumatology has implemented several strategies to try to increase medical student interest in Rheumatology including programs such as Choose Rheumatology! The purpose of this observational study was to investigate impact of development of a student led Rheumatology Interest Group and the Choose Rheumatology! program on medical student interest in Rheumatology at a single institution.

Methods: In April 2015 a student led Rheumatology Interest Group was established at our institution. As part of the inaugural meeting the “Choose Rheumatology!” team presented on careers in rheumatology, several faculty gave testimonials on why they had chosen Rheumatology, and patients spoke on the impact their rheumatologist had on their lives. Follow up meetings included a meeting on finding research projects and two joint injection workshops. To assess medical student interest in rheumatology we retrospectively collected data from the two years before initiation of the interest group (2012-2014) and the year following initiation of the interest group (2015-16) based on four parameters: the number of medical student abstract submissions to the GW Research Day, the number of medical students enrolling in the rheumatology elective, and the number of manuscripts published by faculty with medical students. In order to account for the variable time periods in the pre and post intervention groups, the mean number of student-rheumatology interactions per 6 months in the pre and post intervention periods was assessed for each parameter. Data analysis was performed using GraphPad Prism version 5.00 for Windows (GraphPad Software, San Diego, CA).

Results: Student interest in the rheumatology elective significantly increased following the Interest Group intervention with a mean number of students per 6 months of 2.0±0.36 in the pre intervention period and 7.5±3.5 in the post intervention period (p=0.021). The number of abstract submissions also significantly increased with 0.5±0.34 in the pre-intervention period compared to 7.0±4.0 in the post-intervention period (p=0.017). The number of manuscripts submitted by student-faculty dyads has also increased from 0.16±0.16 to 1.5±0.5 (p=0.013). 

Conclusion: A simple and low cost intervention of development of a student led interest group coupled with a Choose Rheumatology! Campus visit has dramatically impacted student interest in Rheumatology at a single institution.