Instructional skills of surgical tutors

This study was aimed at evaluating the pattern of instructional skills of surgical tutors in a university hospital and the effect of feedback on this pattern.

Students who followed three clinical rotations at the Department of Surgery, Mubarak Al-Kabeer Teaching Hospital, Kuwait, responded anonymously to a structured questionnaire on the instructional skills of their tutors immediately after the rotation was completed. The questionnaire included six statements related to teacher-centred instructional skills and six statements related to student-centred instructional skills. The students indicated their perception on a five-point rating scale (very poor, poor, fair, good and very good). A summary of students' opinions was made available to the teachers soon after each rotation.

The percentage of good/very good categories was significantly higher in the teacher-centred skills compared with the student-centred skills (median (range), 87.05% (85.9-91.7) compared with 79.6% (76.6-80.6), (p = 0.004, Mann Whitney U test). This difference was significant in the first two rotations (p < 0.005) but not in the third rotation (p=0.59).

This study shows that behaviours of teachers which dealt directly with the learner's role in learning received lower emphasis than the teacher-centred activities and that feedback may modify this behaviour.