• Class cancellations lead to disorganized sequence of topics.
• Lectures were crammed in the last weeks of surgical rotation period.
• Further more, the cancellations causing  disarranged academic and extra academic activities.

 This study aims to find out what are the most common causes of class cancellations. 

          There are 36 surgeons in the department of Surgery, Khon Kaen Hospital.

         All of them are lecturers for the 4th to 6th year medical students.

        However answers derived from 22 surgeons.

        Causes of classes cancelations found from the 1st round open ended questions were; lecturers-- having emergency operation,  having a meeting, forgeting  the class; students-- having other activities, having a simultaneous class, 

         Causes of class cancellations found from interviewing and questionnairs in the second round were; surgeons-- having emergency operations, having a meeting; students--having other academic activities.

          The most common cause of cancellation was lecturers having emegency operations.

          Likert scale was not used due to saturated answeres derived through 2 rounds of Delphi method.

          There were 4 medical students reported the most common causes were surgeons having a  meeting  and having emergency operation respectively.

There were many causes of class cancellations.

The most common cause of class cancellation was lecturers having emergency operations.

The second rank was lecturers having a simultaneous meeting.

Whereas the lecturers forgeting the class was the easiest casue to be managed.

Reminding the lecturers before the class at least 24 hours could decrease the rate of class cancellations.

Having co-lecturers  for each topic seems important and might decrease the rate of class cancellations.

Dr.Surachai Saranrithichai, Dr.Kanokwan Sriraksa, Dr.Thammasorn Piriyasupong, Dr.Jiratha Budkaew and also all officers in the Khon Kaen Medical Education Center (KKMEC).