AWARENESS OF INTERVENTIONAL RADIOLOGY AMONG MEDICAL STUDENTS ENROLLED IN DIFFERENT CURRICULA AT WESTERN REGION MEDICAL SCHOOLS IN SAUDI ARABIA

Background: Modern medicine depends heavily on interventional radiology (IR), yet there needs to be more skilled interventional radiologists to meet the demand. However, many undergraduate medical students are unfamiliar with IR's principles, techniques, and strategies. Medical students must be exposed to IR to become future physicians and interventional radiologists.

Objectives: To compare different curriculums regarding awareness and knowledge about IR among undergraduate medical students in Western region medical schools in Saudi Arabia.

Subjects and methods: A multi-site descriptive, cross-sectional study was conducted among fifth- and sixth-year medical students. A valid and reliable questionnaire was used to collect the data.

Results: The study included 803 medical students. Males represented 54.5% of them. Their age ranged between 22 and 26 years, with an arithmetic mean of 23.3 and a standard deviation of 0.8 years. The history of completing or planning to complete an elective in radiology was reported by 15.9% of the participants. In comparison, a history of considering a career in diagnostic or interventional radiology was reported by 15.7% and 16.1% of the participants, respectively. Concerning reasons for not being sure about considering a career in interventional radiology among the participants, the most commonly reported was needing more knowledge about IR (44.3%), followed by finding it not interesting (31.3%). 46.8% of students expressed good knowledge about IR, whereas 35.1% expressed excellent knowledge. Male (p=0.018), older (p<0.001), sixth academic level students (p=0.001), those with a higher GPA (p<0.001), students of King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah (p<0.001), those who reported completing or planning to complete an elective in radiology (p=0.008) and students who had history of ever seeing patients treated by an interventional radiologist (p=0.034) were more knowledgeable about IR compared to their counterparts. According to students, the most preferred method to gain more exposure to interventional radiology was lectures from interventional radiologists, followed by a radiology module.

Conclusion: Most clinical year students in Western Saudi Arabian universities expressed good to excellent knowledge about IR. However, it is recommended that knowledge of IR be reinforced and the level of interest among medical students improved through lectures from interventional radiologists and training modules.

Keywords: interventional radiology, Radiology modules, Knowledge, Medical students