Evaluation of Sleep Medicine Fellowship Program Websites

ABSTRACT

Introduction Fellowship program websites often serve as the initial resource applicants use to learn about programs. Websites have likely become even more important due to social distancing mandates related to the on-going Covid-19 pandemic. In this study, we evaluated the websites of sleep medicine fellowship programs and analyzed the comprehensiveness of their content. Methods Sleep medicine fellowship programs in the United States (US) for the 2021 match cycle were identified using the Electronic Residency Application Service (ERAS) directory and the Fellowship and Residency Electronic Interactive database (FREIDA). Twenty-two prespecified website content criteria related to education, recruitment, and compensation were evaluated. Programs’ website comprehensiveness was compared based on geographic location (Northeast/Midwest/South/West);type of programs (Community/University);programs matching status (Complete/Partial or No matching status);core specialty (Internal medicine/Other specialties);and program size (based on number of sleep fellows). Results A total of 78 US sleep fellowship program’ websites were evaluated. Most (80.8%) had a direct functional link to ERAS or FREIDA websites. The percentage of sleep medicine fellowship program’ websites reporting each of the twenty-two-criterion was highly variable (range 2.6%-98.7%). The percentage of overall website comprehensiveness among sleep medicine fellowship programs was 56.8%±16.5% (range13.6%-90.9%). There was a significantly higher educational website content comprehensiveness for the Internal medicine compared to other specialties-based sleep programs (p = 0.002). There were no significant association between the overall, educational, recruitment, and compensation website content comprehensiveness of sleep programs and their US region location, type of affiliation, matching status, or program size. Conclusion Website content comprehensiveness amongst sleep fellowship programs in the US is variable with a lower educational content on website pages of non-internal medicine-based sleep programs. Improvement in website content of sleep medicine programs is a potentially easy way for programs to improve fellow recruitment, and more importantly, allow prospective sleep fellow applicants to make a more informed decision with regards to program selection. Support (If Any) This study was not funded.