Caveat: the following is just my humble opinion and I could be wrong.
BUT. I think that a mandatory 2 years of research during general surgery residency is completely unnecessary. In an era when surgical leaders in general surgery are looking to streamline residency training, it makes no sense to require residents to do research.
I have seen firsthand several residents enter their "research years" with great reluctance, and view them at best as a "vacation" and at worst 2 years of punishment. Some residents thrive in this period of time, and publish well but most underperform. Some view this time as a period to start a family and "have a break".
From a faculty standpoint, having research residents has obvious benefits. You have residents that can do your research grunt work for you while you are doing cases and meeting your clinical production requirements. Having residents also allows you to publish papers at a rate that you would never be able to maintain on your own, and contributes to your career advancement.
Some arguments for resident research years are typically:
1. Allows residents to learn to critically analyze papers and interpret journal papers.
2. Allows residents to build their cv and help prepare them for competitive fellowship matches.
3. Helps lay the foundation for an academic career by learning how to write grants, and by building relationships/mentorships with important people in your field of interest.
4. Gives residents a break during residency.
I would counter these arguments by:
1. Residents can learn to critically analyze papers fairly easily. One does not need to take 1-3 years out of residency to do this. I learned to do this in medical school.
2. Residents can easily write papers while in residency. It requires a little extra work but can be easily done. With the 80 hour workweek and further work hour restrictions, there is no reason why residents should not be able to publish 2 or 3 papers a year at the minimum. I know several residents who managed to publish 25+ papers over their 5 year general surgery residency with no time out for research.
3. It's reasonable to expect to make important connections during 2 years of research. One may even lay the foundation for a future academic career by cementing important relationships during residency. However this is quite unnecessary in the modern era of academics. As far as your first academic job, where you trained is probably more important than if you did 2 years of research. Once you get your first academic job, then it's what you do from there, not what you did during general surgery residency. Also, with the possible exception of peds surgery, their are no fellowships for which general surgery research time is mandatory.
4. As for getting a break during residency... seriously? With the 56 hour intern rule, and the 80 hour workweek? I might buy the whole "it gives one a chance to live life during a grueling general surgery residency" argument if it was 1985. But when my intern regularly slips out after rounds to go to the gym, and when the term "post call" is now part of the everyday vocabulary, and when every resident is guaranteed 1 day in 7 free of clinical duties, is this really "grueling"? I think the the whole "gives you a break" argument is outdated and we should lay that to rest.
I would add that there is a huge opportunity cost associated with spending 2 years out of residency in someone's lab. These 2 years are 2 years that you will lose of peak earning years. The loss in revenue to the research resident runs in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Obviously I am against having mandatory research for general surgery residents. There is no good reason for residents to do it, although there are benefits for faculty members to have these residents.
I acknowledge that there are a few residents who are in the PhD track for whom research makes sense because they will have the extra degree and these folks are driven and from a career/interest point of view makes sense for them. But for the vast majority of general surgery residents, mandatory research is not beneficial.
Someone posted that other subspecialties do not do research. However many ent, ortho, and urology programs have up to 6 months of built in research in their residencies. These residents are also expected to publish, and they do.
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