Publish or Perish

 

This article in AusDoc resonates with me and clearly quite a few of my peers. I think it is important for a doctor, regardless whether they are a generalist or a specialist, to at least have done some sort of research once. Indeed, the research output for the majority of these would likely be an audit of some kind, with the intention of reviewing practice rather than adding to the "noise" in the sea of published research. This, indeed, shouldn't be a prerequisite to advanced training, which is becoming a written/unwritten rule for most specialities these days. This is a shame. 

Yet, this problem is not new. Do we really need a ATAR of 99.5 or above for medical school entrance? In Australia, we have somewhat sorted this out by making most medical school entrances postgraduate. But does this really solve the problem of trying to identify those who would otherwise be excellent physicians but just don't have the academic aptitude?