Professional behaviours demonstrated by undergraduate dental students using an incident reporting system

Critical incident reporting is widely used across healthcare and other sectors for reporting adverse events or behaviours. More recently it has been used in medical education as a means of assessing student professionalism. The aims of this study were to determine the usage of critical incident forms when reporting behaviours related to professionalism demonstrated by undergraduate dental students, and the types of behaviours exhibited. Three types of form could be awarded for highly professional (green), minor unprofessional (yellow) and serious unprofessional (red) behaviours. All forms completed over a two-year period were analysed recording the year of student, type of card and demographic of the member of staff reporting the incident. All text relating to the nature of the incident was entered into a qualitative data analysis software package and analysed thematically. In total, 583 cards were awarded, 55% green, 34% yellow and 11% red. Seventy-four percent of cards were awarded in a clinical environment, with administrative staff using them the most (29%). The overwhelming professional behaviours demonstrated related to altruism. The most common unprofessional behaviours related to a lack of conscientiousness, although a greater range of common unprofessional behaviours were reported. In conclusion, critical incidents forms were widely used for reporting both professional and unprofessional behaviours particularly in clinical environments by a range of staff. Such forms may be a valuable addition to the professionalism assessment portfolio, capturing behaviours not previously reported using traditional methods.