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Improving communication skills: feedback from faculty and residents
Jonathan Sherbino1, Glen Bandiera
1Residency Program, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. j.sherbino@utoronto.ca
Summary
Faculty and peer feedback for emergency medicine residents on oral presentations revealed distinct themes. Key areas for improvement included enhancing teaching points, audience engagement, and critical thinking skills.
Area of Science:
- Medical Education
- Emergency Medicine
- Communication Skills Training
Background:
- Effective communication is crucial for emergency medicine (EM) residents.
- Oral presentations are a key method for residents to demonstrate and receive feedback on their clinical reasoning and communication abilities.
- Understanding the nuances of feedback from different sources, such as faculty and peers, is essential for targeted educational interventions.
Purpose of the Study:
- To identify and analyze common themes present in faculty and peer feedback provided to emergency medicine residents regarding their oral presentations.
- To compare and contrast the feedback themes provided by faculty versus peer reviewers.
- To inform the development of improved communication skills curricula for EM residents.
Main Methods:
- A grounded theory approach was employed to analyze written feedback on communication skills.
- Feedback was collected from two faculty and two peer reviewers for each resident over a six-month period.
- Investigators developed a common coding system through independent review and consensus to ensure reliability and consistency in data analysis.
Main Results:
- Three hundred seventy-two data points were coded from 21 participating residents, achieving 85.7% interrater agreement.
- The most frequent feedback themes included focusing on key teaching points, increasing audience participation, encouraging higher-level thinking, reducing content per slide, and adding relevant missing content.
- Significant differences emerged between faculty and peer feedback, with peers emphasizing higher-level thinking and missing content, while faculty focused more on clarity and enthusiasm.
Conclusions:
- A model for individualized, behavior-based feedback incorporating peer input is proposed for EM residents.
- Recognizing the distinct perspectives of faculty and peers in feedback is vital for comprehensive resident development.
- The study's findings can guide the refinement of communication skills training programs within emergency medicine residency education.