Understanding Trainees’ Perception Concerning the Educational Process in General Practice, Does it Help?

Abstract

Background: Trainees’ skills and the teaching process can be improved by consideration of candidates’ views.

Aim: To find out the trainees’ perception and views about the features and teaching methods of the Family Practice Training Program (FPSTP) in Kuwait to upgrade its standard.

Methods: The study design is cross sectional descriptive one. Data were collected from fifty seven trainees and twenty seven newly graduated doctors from FPSTP in Kuwait. The questionnaire included, in addition to personal characteristic, two sections. The first one was used to explore their views about different teaching methods. The second one included questions related to specific aspects of the program.

Results: the response rate was 93.3%. Most of the trainees received tutorials (76.2%) and case discussions (72.6%). About half of them (54.8%) had joint consultations. More than half of them (63.1%) think that joint consultation sessions are useful. Video consultation analysis was viewed beneficial by about half of them (57.1%). The majority of the participants think that communicative skills improved by case discussion (91.7%) and observed consultation (89.3%), and they find it easy to discuss clinical problems with trainers (82.1%). Most of the graduated doctors (74.4%) think that Clinical Audit is useful for the training program, while less than half of the trainees (49.1%) believe in this, with a significant difference. (P = 0.03) between the two groups of participants.

Conclusion: Feedback from trainees is essential in order to measure their level of satisfaction with teaching methods and for improvement of the educational process for family practitioners.