Letter to the Editor: Editorial: Should Orthopaedic Residents Be Required to Do Research, or Would Critical Reading Programs Be a Better Use of Their Time?

To the Editor,

I read your editorial [2] and found myself agreeing in large measure with what you wrote. In short summary, I concur: Research is not for everyone. We need to make the most of the residents' time and effort.

Still, the topic is controversial, and a colleague and good friend has written in with a diverging viewpoint [1].

I have been involved in research and intrigued by exploration and hypothesis testing ever since I started my residency. I started out as a community orthopaedic surgeon, but that did not stop me from trying to be productive as a researcher. A few years later, I rejoined academia and continued my research endeavors. I now train young orthopaedic surgeons-to-be. My observations over the last several years parallel that of your editorial. All residents are engaged in research, but a few do so out of requirement, not curiosity. Some join research tracks that include a full research year and continue to pursue a career in academia, whereas others get burnt out and opt for community practice. As such, a proportion of residents do not get much value from conducting research other than fulfilling their requirements to graduate. Those residents may be better served if we educate them as consumers of research within the constraints of their residency programs.

I do support creating pathways from which residents can choose. For example, one track would be to pursue research if they are willing to make the commitment to complete what they started. Another track would educate residents to be critical readers of the available evidence. An added advantage of having this second track might be that those in the critical reading track could help the producers of research in their programs avoid traps that may devalue or undermine those research projects.

The long-term benefit of having residents who dedicate themselves to critical reading is that they may become especially effective peer reviewers. Unfortunately, many peer reviewers evaluate papers based on their own preferences and interests, rather than with a background (and specific training in) formal critical appraisal.