Recruitment of medical students and junior doctors in to psychiatry is a long-standing concern in many countries, with low proportions of medical graduates choosing it as a specialty and ongoing stigma from within the medical profession. In some countries the reverse problem is the case, with too many doctors wishing to enter psychiatry, and insufficient training places available.

To understand the current situation within Europe with regards to recruitment in to psychiatry and to identify existing recruitment initiatives.

The European Federation of Psychiatric Trainees conducts an annual survey of all member organisations. A delegate of each national association of psychiatric trainees is asked to identify if their country has a problem with recruitment and if so, whether there were too many or too few applicants for training places. Delegates from countries with recruitment initiatives were contacted to provide further details.

In 2014, a total of 31 countries completed the survey, with 17 stating that too few medical practitioners choose psychiatry. In total 8 countries with recruitment problems reported that initiatives exist to encourage doctors to enter psychiatric training. Of these, 7 responded to describe the initiatives, which included national recruitment strategies, financial incentives, careers fairs, mentoring schemes and a whole host of other projects.

Recruitment in to psychiatry remains a serious problem in a significant proportion of European countries, but a wide range of initiatives exist which aim to combat this shortfall. It will be important over the coming years to establish which initiatives are most effective at increasing recruitment.