TY - JOUR
T1 - Measuring the reasons that discourage medical students from working in rural areas
AU - Goel, Sonu
AU - Angeli, Federica
AU - Singla, Neetu
AU - Ruwaard, Dirk
N1 - © 2018 the Author(s)
PY - 2018/1/1
Y1 - 2018/1/1
N2 - The sharply uneven distribution of human resources for health care across urban and rural areas has been a long-standing concern globally. The present study aims to develop and validate an instrument measuring the factors deterring final year students of Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) in 3 northern states of India, from working in rural areas. The medical student's de-motivation to work in rural India (MSDRI) scale was developed using extensive literature review followed by Delphi technique. The psychometric properties of the questionnaire were assessed in terms of content validity, construct validity, data quality and reliability. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) followed by confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed to identify the primary deterrents. Thirty-three items were generated from literature search followed by Delphi exercise. After assessing psychometric properties, the final instrument included 29 items whereas the EFA and CFA highlighted 5 main factors, namely lack of professional challenge, social segregation, socio-cultural gap, hostile professional environment, and lack of financial incentives as underpinning students' demotivation towards working in rural areas. The MSDRI instrument is the first valid and reliable measure for identifying deterring factors for MBBS students to work in rural areas of India. The use of it may be very helpful for policymakers as well as healthcare organizations in formulating effective measures to encourage medical students to work in rural areas, which suffer from a chronic shortage of medical personnel.
AB - The sharply uneven distribution of human resources for health care across urban and rural areas has been a long-standing concern globally. The present study aims to develop and validate an instrument measuring the factors deterring final year students of Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) in 3 northern states of India, from working in rural areas. The medical student's de-motivation to work in rural India (MSDRI) scale was developed using extensive literature review followed by Delphi technique. The psychometric properties of the questionnaire were assessed in terms of content validity, construct validity, data quality and reliability. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) followed by confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed to identify the primary deterrents. Thirty-three items were generated from literature search followed by Delphi exercise. After assessing psychometric properties, the final instrument included 29 items whereas the EFA and CFA highlighted 5 main factors, namely lack of professional challenge, social segregation, socio-cultural gap, hostile professional environment, and lack of financial incentives as underpinning students' demotivation towards working in rural areas. The MSDRI instrument is the first valid and reliable measure for identifying deterring factors for MBBS students to work in rural areas of India. The use of it may be very helpful for policymakers as well as healthcare organizations in formulating effective measures to encourage medical students to work in rural areas, which suffer from a chronic shortage of medical personnel.
KW - barriers
KW - career choice
KW - discouraging factors
KW - India
KW - medical students
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85041481574&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1097/MD.0000000000009448
DO - 10.1097/MD.0000000000009448
M3 - Article
C2 - 29480833
AN - SCOPUS:85041481574
SN - 0025-7974
VL - 97
JO - Medicine (United States)
JF - Medicine (United States)
IS - 2
M1 - 9448
ER -