Student professionalism in clerkships.

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Professionalism Assessment

Background:

• Assessing professionalism in medical clerkships is challenging.
• Existing literature often focuses on generalities or negative examples.
• Current assessment tools frequently rely on Likert scales.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the frequency and detail of professionalism descriptions in end-of-clerkship narrative assessments.
• To identify themes within detailed narrative feedback on professional behaviors.

Main Methods:

• Qualitative thematic analysis of de-identified final clerkship narratives.
• Utilized ATLAS.ti software and a six-step thematic approach.
• Analyzed narratives from academic years 2018-2020.

Main Results:

• Only 23% of narratives mentioned professionalism; 16% of those offered detailed descriptions.
• Seven core themes emerged from detailed feedback: time management, follow-through, engagement, work ethic, communication, exceeding expectations, and situational awareness.
• Identified behaviors range from basic to advanced, relevant to residency training.

Conclusions:

• Narratives lacking specific examples of professionalism are ineffective for learning and assessment.
• A hierarchical framework can guide students and supervisors in providing actionable feedback.
• The proposed model promotes a growth mindset for professionalism development.