Evaluation of the reflecting team as an educational intervention

Background: The reflecting team is a way of exploring clinical or educational dilemmas. A key difference from traditional case discussion is that the case presenter is not actively involved in the group discussion but instead listens to the ideas and thoughts generated, without contributing to the narrative. The origins of the reflecting team are in family therapy and there is little evidence on how successfully the technique can be transposed to clinical or educational practice.Aim: To evaluate the effectiveness of the reflecting team as an educational intervention.Design and setting: Interpretive action research involving 10 GPs who were either enrolled on the Induction and Refresher Scheme or who were members of a learning set of GP educators.Method: Interview data were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim and thematic analysis was used to identify themes.Results: The reflecting team appeared to be an effective and acceptable intervention. Key features of the reflecting team included the opening up of new perspectives, feeling validated by peers, the need for ground rules and the perception of the reflecting team as a practical tool.Conclusions: The reflecting team is a new way of undertaking case discussion in GP education and seems to offer some advantages over traditional case discussion. It lends itself well to learning groups and it is possible that the idea might be transposed to clinical settings too.