A narrative review of the decade-long integration of professional postgraduate education with standardized residency training in China
Year: 2026
Type: review
Abstract: Since 2014, China has comprehensively implemented the Standardized Residency Training (SRT) program nationwide, and the integration of professional postgraduate education with SRT has operated for over a decade. This narrative review, based on searches of Wanfang Data and PubMed from January 2015 to December 2025, examines the achievements, persistent challenges, and reform options of this integration system. While the system has shortened medical training from six to three years and enriched clinical exposure, a fundamental structural contradiction persists: the dual identity of professional postgraduates as both "students" and "residents" creates an inherent conflict between clinical practice and academic training. Within the fixed three-year period, postgraduates bear the combined burden of 33 months of clinical rotations, coursework, and thesis research, leaving insufficient protected time for scientific research, compounded by misaligned training objectives, welfare inequity, delayed licensure, and elevated mental health burdens. Enrollment expansion has further strained training capacity and produced crowding-out effects on the broader medical talent pipeline. Implementation-level adjustments can partially alleviate these issues but cannot resolve the core contradiction. Reform should prioritize addressing the dual-identity tension through either flexible decoupling or complete separation of the two pathways, drawing on international experiences.
Source: Frontiers in Medicine
Authors: Wenda Wang, Xin Zhao, Yi Zhao, Wenwen Chen, Xingcheng Wu
Language: English
Subfield: Education
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $3,801
OpenAlex ID: W7223276623