The Role of Preoperative Briefing and Postoperative Debriefing in Surgical Education

To study the impact of a new preoperative briefing and postoperative debriefing tool on the perceived quality of surgical education and to assess attitudes of residents and attendings regarding this tool.

Surrounding introduction and use of the tool (JHFIRE: Joint Huddles for Improving Resident Education), perceived quality of surgical education was assessed with pre- and postintervention System for Evaluation of Teaching Qualities (SETQ) surveys. Additionally, a postintervention Likert survey regarding the JHFIRE tool itself was completed by residents and faculty.

Johns Hopkins University Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, a tertiary care academic institution.

All residents and attendings who used the tool were invited to participate. 40 participants (13 residents, 27 attendings) completed the preintervention SETQ. 11 participants (3 residents, 7 attendings, 1 unspecified) completed the postintervention SETQ. For postintervention qualitative assessment of the tool itself, 12 participants (3 residents, 7 attendings, 2 unspecified) provided feedback.

The tool was well-received with large subjective benefit in improving resident surgical education. A total of 88% thought that the time spent on the debriefings was "just right" and 91% planned to make the debriefings a regular part of operative performance assessments. Despite this overwhelmingly positive feedback, there was no overall difference in pre- and postintervention SETQ scores for climate of surgical education in the Department (4.25 ± 0.55 vs. 4.10 ± 0.88, p = 0.63).

Introduction of 4 item preoperative briefing and 4 item postoperative debriefing checklists was welcomed by both residents and faculty for its ability to shape surgical education in the operating room into a guided discovery model of hands-on education. Overall SETQ scores did not change, but most participants found value in the tool and plan to continue its use.