Professional trends of the surgical instrument technician program graduates from a higher education institution in colombia Estado de las tendencias profesionales del Instrumentador Quirúrgico graduado de una Institución de Educación Superior de Colombia (IES)

Abstract

Introduction: current challenges in the health sector demand more participative and competitive professionals, thus, academic programs track their graduates in order to know about their contextual, economic, labor and academic situation. This data provides an input allowing the academic community and the productive and social sector to identify the relevant curricula and professional trends. Objective: to identify the professional trends of the surgical instrument technician program graduates from Universidad El Bosque between 2012-1 and 2019-1. Materials and methods: descriptive cross-sectional study in 274 graduates from the surgical instrument technician program (2012-1 to 2019-1) of a university in Bogota, in a sample of 251 graduates. Data on sociodemographic variables, employment trends and postgraduate or complementary training was collected. Results: 90% were females, 87.6% were currently working. The top percent work in the clinical area (45.0%) and 32.3% as surgical technologists. They had also ventured into other fields such as the commercial, administrative, teaching and research fields, 15.0% continued their skills development. Conclusions: there is coherence between the surgical instrument technician professional profile developed in this training program and the fields of performance identified. Higher education institutions need to formulate strategies promoting postgraduate training using current education modalities (on-campus, online or hybrid).