Career In Clinical Neurosciences

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The neurosciences procedure workshop overall proved successful and popular among students who attended. A large majority of students (95%) who attended either maintained or increased an interest in pursuing a career in the clinical neurosciences. For those students who did not have interest in the clinical neurosciences after attending the workshop, the event may have helped inform their choice, and even these students left positive comments about the experience. Although data about the workshop’s influence on eventual specialty choice are beyond the scope of this study, various studies have shown that a high-quality preclinical education in the neurosciences is a highly influential factor. This may be particularly true at schools where other exposures to a given specialty are limited. It may be presumed that the high attendance and positive feedback from students regarding our procedure workshop demonstrate a contribution to their overall preclinical neuroscience experience. A single hands-on procedure workshop improved medical student interest in the clinical neurosciences. Although its direct impact on specialty choice is beyond the scope of this study, enjoyable preclinical experiences such as a procedure workshop would be a useful addition to medical school curricula to foster interest in neurology and the clinical neurosciences. A future direction of study would be to survey students from the class who attended the workshop and matched into the neurosciences about whether the activity influenced their specialty choice.