Academic Global Surgery

Book excerpt: This seventh book in the series of Success in Academic Surgery look to sustain the field and facilitate the next generation of leaders in Academic Global Surgery. It brings together a catalogue of current knowledge, needs, and pathways to a career in the field. Academic Global Surgery involves educational, research and clinical collaborations between academic humanitarian surgeons in high-income countries (HIC), their low and middle-income country (LMIC) partners and their respective academic institutions. The goal of these collaborations is improving understanding of surgical disease, and increasing access to and capacity for surgical care in resource-poor regions. In the last few years, the rapid exchange of ideas through social media and other technologies has combined with an increasing appreciation of worldwide health disparities to put the issue of global health at the forefront of our consciousness. Although traditionally neglected within public health initiatives, surgical disease is now recognized as a major contributor to death and disability worldwide, while surgical therapy in resource-poor areas is increasingly being shown to be cost-effective. In response to this growing recognition, what began as mission trips and short-term clinical volunteerism in the developing world has evolved into a burgeoning new field with a broader scope. While the tremendous recent interest from medical students and residents in Globa l Surgery has stimulated an exponential growth of interest in this field, current surgical literature has highlighted the need for further development and delineation of this new discipline within academic surgery.