A Qualitative Study of Improving Preceptor Feedback Delivery on Professionalism to Postgraduate Year 1 Residents Through Education, Observation, and Reflection

Background To better standardize the teaching of professionalism, the American Board of Internal Medicine and the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education established competency-based training milestones for internal medicine residency programs. Accordingly, professionalism milestones served as the basis for a faculty development program centered on providing feedback to postgraduate year 1 residents (interns) on their own professionalism behaviors during preceptor-resident sessions in the internal medicine continuity clinic.

Methods To determine the level of faculty (n=8) understanding and comfort in providing feedback, surveys listing 12-month professionalism milestones were distributed to core internal medicine teaching faculty. Current interns (n=10) also rated their understanding of the same milestones. The faculty development program included interpersonal communication education, role-plays of difficult situations, and pocket resources, as well as direct feedback on videotaped sessions with residents. At the end of the intervention period, participating faculty completed a postdevelopment survey, and the current 6-month interns completed a follow-up assessment.

Results Average ratings between the pre- and postintervention teaching faculty surveys fell approximately 0.25%-0.50% on all measures of understanding, but increased slightly on measures of comfort. Conversely, average ratings between the pre- and postintervention 6-month intern surveys generally increased 0.25%-0.50% for measures of comfort and understanding.

Conclusions The faculty perceived the intervention as helpful in teaching them to focus on behaviors that change the context of overall feedback delivery. However, the study results showed that the system in place was not conducive to implementing such a program without modification and the introduction of resources.