A longitudinal career-focused block for third-year pediatrics residents

The traditional 1-month training blocks in pediatrics may fail to provide sufficient exposure to develop the knowledge, skills, and attitudes residents need for practice and may not be conducive to mentoring relationships with faculty and continuity with patients.

We created a 4-month career-focused experience (CFE) for third-year residents. The CFE included block time and longitudinal experiences in different content areas related to residents' choice of urban and rural primary care, hospitalist medicine, or subspecialty care (prefellowship). Content was informed by graduate surveys, focus groups with primary care pediatricians and hospitalists, and interviews with fellowship directors. Outcomes were assessed via before and after surveys of residents' attitudes and skills, assessment of skills with an objective structured clinical examination (OSCE), and interviews with residents and mentors.

Twenty-three of 49 third-year residents took part in the first 2 years of CFE. Two residents dropped out, leaving 21 who completed the 4-month experience (9 in primary care, 2 in hospitalist medicine, and 10 in a subspecialty). Residents reported improvement in their clinical skills, increased satisfaction with faculty mentoring and evaluation, and the ability to focus on what was important to their careers. OSCE performance did not differ between residents who completed the CFE and those who did not. Administrative burden was high.

Four-month career-focused training for pediatrics residents is feasible and may be effective in meeting part of the new requirement for 6 months of career-focused training during pediatrics residency.