Group training of general practitioners: evaluation based on participants' expectations of an educational programme

Since 1985, the Norwegian Medical Association (NMA) has offered a 5-year specialist training programme in general practice. For two of these years the doctors take part in a group-based educational programme with bi-weekly meetings of 3 hours' duration. The evaluation study reported here had a dual purpose: to provide the groups with a method for exploring the group members' expectations of the programme, and to measure to what extent the programme had actually met these expectations within the first of the 2 years. Thirty-one of 38 groups, first established in spring 1986, responded on a postal inquiry where they were asked to list up to 10 features they expected to find in the educational programme. These expectations were rated by the groups on a five-point scale, where 5 denoted a fully met expectation. The four most frequent features analysed were: (1) increased comprehension of the characteristics and practice of general medicine; (2) good group collaboration; (3) facilitating the acquisition of medical knowledge; and (4) evaluation of clinical problems and patient management. Expectations for the first two of these features were nearly fully met, while the two others were met to a lesser degree. This type of evaluation seemed to be a useful tool for improving the group's way of functioning.