Attitude of Nigerian surgical residents towards trauma care

To investigate the attitude of some Nigerian surgical residents to trauma care.

Surgical residents from three tertiary care facilities located in South Western Nigeria completed a structured questionnaire, which contained twelve questions directed at eliciting their attitude to trauma care.

Fifty-four residents completed the questionnaire. Majority of them were males (88.9%) and aged =30 years (96.3%). Over half (55.6%) were junior residents and one third each had stayed for <2 years, >2-4 years and >4 years respectively in training. Specialties represented included Oral and maxillofacial surgery, General surgery, Orthopaedic surgery, Ophthalmology, Otorhinolaryngology, Urology and Cardio thoracic unit. Only 9.3% and 13.0% of them had received training in the ACLS and ATLS respectively. However, most trainees displayed moderate (42.6%) to major (46.3%) interest in care of the injured judging by the time in future practice hoped to be dedicated to trauma care. Most trainees considered trauma care a rewarding, gratifying and essential aspect of all surgeons practice. At the same time, majority felt it is stressful, time consuming and disrupts a lot of routine activities.

The studied group displayed a high level of interest in the care of the injured and willingness to devote quality time to this despite the fact that trauma care was considered stressful and time consuming. A need to review our training curriculum to ensure that ATLS and ACLS are incorporated early in the training was observed.