Supervisory needs of research doctoral students in a university teaching hospital setting

Teaching hospitals affiliated with universities are now common sites for research higher degree supervision. We hypothesised that the hospital environment poses unique challenges to supervision compared with the traditional university research institute setting.

This study aimed to identify and rank important supervision issues in a clinical setting from the students' perspective.

Using the Delphi method to explore issues and facilitate consensus, small group discussions were conducted with 10 research doctoral students from a tertiary teaching hospital.

We identified supervision issues that are unique to the hospital-based context. These include the demands placed on supervisors combining clinical and supervisory roles, the challenges of academic medical/scientific writing and career issues for students who are already established in their professions. Other issues identified, common to all doctoral students, include differing expectations between students and supervisors (with students wanting support for their career plans, training in research skills and increasing autonomy and responsibility), supervisor access, quality and frequency of meetings, lack of training in writing and dealing with conflicts.

Our research identified that postgraduate students of supervisors who combine clinical and supervisory roles report significant issues with supervision, some of which are unique to the clinical setting. Clinician researchers who supervise postgraduate students need to balance clinical and supervisory responsibilities, identify and negotiate student expectations early in candidature and provide career counselling to students who are already highly experienced. Furthermore, clinician supervisors should undertake postgraduate supervisor training programme tailored to the hospital setting to better support their students.