A shortage of medical academics is threatening to undermine the UK’s vital clinical research base and leave some medical schools struggling to teach their students, a leading medical academic says.
Professor Michael Rees, co-chair of the BMA’s medical academic staff committee, warned delegates at the Conference of Medical Academic Representatives that while the number of medical academics has declined in the past 10 years, medical student numbers have doubled.
Prof Rees said: “Our medical academic base is now barely able to sustain the increased number of medical students. The temptation in this time of financial crisis might be for universities to shed further medical academic staff. This would be a grave mistake. It would result in a worse student experience at a time of rising fees, and further undermine our research base.”
He said the likelihood of further redundancies in academic staff over the next few years could make the situation worse “not just for the medical academics we represent, but for the current and future generations of medical students and the patients they will serve”.
The number of medical academics has fallen to around 3,100 according to the latest figures from the Medical Schools Council. This is down from the estimated 4,963 in 2000. The number of medical students entering medical school has increased by 43% since 2000, up from 5,610 to 8,009 in 2010.
Rees also warned the conference that changes to funding threaten to further undermine education and research.
“Changes to the funding of our universities, modifications to the funding of clinical teaching and the new Health and Social Care Bill in England all threaten to destabilise further medical academia in this country and with it the valuable contribution medical academics make to UK, through the NHS, our universities and industry,” he said.
Tags: Academic posts, Cuts
