title: Review of the training program of pediatric residents: is it appropriate for their future careers?
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Training of pediatric residents is a dynamic process which should be changed as the nature andepidemiology of pediatric diseases change. In this study, we compared the training program of the pediatric residentswith the disorders of the pediatric patients who had referred to pediatric offices.
  
  
  METHODS
  The study was conducted in pediatric offices in Shiraz, South of Iran. The main complaints of all thepatients who were referred to these offices in the first 3 days of the four seasons of the year were recorded. Finally,descriptive statistics was used to determine the frequency of different complaints among these patients.
  
  
  RESULTS
  There are 58 Pediatrics offices in Shiraz and 37 offices completed the questioners (64%). The mostfrequent complaints of the patients were related to infections, especially respiratory and gastrointestinal ones.Nutritional and growth problems were other frequent complaints. Nonetheless, a high number of the patientswere referred due to skin, eye, or ear problems or for check up of the baby.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  There is an important training-practice problem in the curriculum of pediatric residents. Thus, wesuggest decreasing the periods of inpatient subspecialty training and increasing the period of outpatient dermatology,ophthalmology, otolaryngology, and well-baby clinics.
authors.affiliation: Assistant professor of Pediatric Endocrinology and Metabolism, Department of Pediatrics, Nemazee Teaching Hospital, Medical School, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran. drmoravej@yahoo.com.
authors.forename: Hossein
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Moravej
authors.affiliation: Associate Professor of Pediatric gastroenterology, Gastroenterohepatology Research Center, Nemazee Teaching Hospital, Medical School, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran.
authors.forename: Seyed Mohsen
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Dehghani
keywords: Training; complaints; pediatric residents