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Is a career in emergency medicine associated with stigma?
1John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, UK. drsimonmsmith@hotmail.com
Objective:
Many emergency medicine staff report anecdotally that fellow hospital staff have a low opinion of emergency medicine. No research into this attitude has been published. The aim of this study is to determine whether there is stigma attached to emergency medicine and practitioners.
Method:
A postal questionnaire of all medical staff at a district general hospital, to evaluate the presence or absence of eight perceptions associated with stigma.
Results:
The response rate was 49.5%, with the response rate decreasing with decreasing grade. Of the stigmatizing themes tested in this study, six of the eight were demonstrated to be associated with negative attitudes, with the remaining two themes positive attitudes towards emergency medicine were suggested. The responses were similar, irrespective of grade and speciality (where given by respondees). Responses that were ambivalent or not completed varied between 25 and 48% in the returned questionnaires.
Conclusions:
This paper demonstrates that stigmatizing opinions towards emergency medicine exist and that these negative opinions may be widely held by hospital staff.