S1227 National Based Survey of All Gastroenterology Fellowship Trainees During COVID-19 Pandemic

INTRODUCTION: COVID-19 pandemic has created chaos in the healthcare system and widely impacted our personal and academic life We conducted a survey questionnaire for gastroenterology trainees to understand the educational, psychological, physical and social impact of this crisis METHODS: National based survey questionnaires were securely sent to program coordinators and distributed to all gastroenterology fellows from various parts of the United States, via email over 3 weeks period RESULTS: A total of 246 GI fellows participated (153 males & 93 females), with a mean age of 35 ± 5 years 67% were married (n = 165) and 31% had children (n = 76) (Figure 1) Majority of the trainees are American graduates (69%) Our sample consisted of 212 fellows from university program and 34 from community program The year of fellowship was evenly distributed between 1st (n = 88), 2nd (n = 77) and 3rd year (n = 75) of training During the pandemic, 91% fellows participated in telehealth visits (n = 224) and only 5 fellows reported lack of supervisors in this situation Majority of the fellows continued practicing GI related issues (N = 227) and on top of that, 22 4% were deployed covering medicine wards (n = 56), 9% covering ICU (n = 22), and only one fellow covered ED 121 fellows reporting COVID19 severely impacted their GI practice, followed by 87 fellows reporting moderate to severe effects and 38 experiencing mild to moderate impacts 41% of fellows were not following social distancing mainly due to lack of space to sit 6 feet apart and also since they were wearing a mask 22 4% (n = 54) of fellows felt that they would not have sufficient procedural volume and/or training to be a practicing gastroenterologist but only 3 7% (n = 9) wanted to extend the fellowship The fellows wanted more procedural training in colonoscopy (45%) with polypectomy (52 4%) and hemostasis (38 6%) In order to minimize COVID19 exposure, many hospitals allowed only attending to perform procedures The majority of the fellows disagreed with this new practice (46%;n = 115) (Figure-2) Finally, 4 9% fellows acquired COVID-19 (n = 12) and only one was admitted (4 of those fellows did not have proper PPE) CONCLUSION: COVID-19 pandemic has a major impact affecting the learning process in GI fellowship programs The fear among many trainees is mainly due to the lack of performing GI procedures and the impact on their skill in the future (Table Presented)