Use of a needs assessment tool for the development of research curriculum for postgraduate medical education trainees in King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre (KFSH&amp;RC)
Creators: name: Alhaider, Sami
Publisher: name: Graduate Studies
Year: 2013
Subjects: subject: Education
subject: Needs
subject: Assessment
subject: Research
subject: Curriculum
subject: Post-graduate
subject: Medical
subject: Education

description: Objective: To conduct a needs assessment for a research curriculum development by assessing perceptions of postgraduate trainees and educators toward research training in King Faisal Specialist Hospital &amp; Research Centre (KFSH&amp;RC). Methods: Two questionnaires (one for trainees and the other for educators) were employed. A total of 70 trainees (residents and fellows) out of 117 participated, for a response rate of 59.8%. Fifty two percent of participants were females. The majority of trainees ranged in age between 26-30 years (54%). There were more residents than fellows (58% vs. 42%). Nearly half of the responding trainees graduated from King Saud University (KSU) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (41.5%). The responding trainees had different levels of training which was found to be relatively equally representative of each training-year in the program. The majority of responding trainees belong to medical programs (68.7%). The remainder of trainees belongs to surgical (11.9%), laboratory (4.5%), and other (14.9%) programs (Pathology: 6%, Radiology: 4.5%, Dentistry: 3%, Pharmacology: 1.5%). A total of 40 educators (program directors, deputy program directors, consultants involved in training programs and consultants with research interest) responded to the questionnaire, out of 70 educators contacted, for a response rate of 57%. The majority of the responding educators were males (72.5%) and with age below 50years (36-40yrs: 20%, 41-50yrs: 52.5%). More than half of educators defined their role as program directors (52.5%) with the remaining as educators (30%), and researchers (5%). Fifty eight percent of educators belong to pure medical specialties (57.5%) and the rest from surgery (25%), and others (10%) while the rest are unknown (7.5%). Results: Trainees and educators shared similar perceptions about the role of research. Most trainees reported that they have no research productivity during their training (93% never applied for research grants, 74% never had presentations or scientific publication). Most educators (75%) reported ongoing research projects in their departments. Most participants (trainees and educators) agreed that current strategies are not sufficient to address research training (66% and 78%), KFSH&amp;RC represent rich environment for research training (76% and 70%), lack of protected time represent a barrier for research training (85% and 70%), hands-on research projects to be part of the proposed curriculum, and to be part of graduation requirements (69, 60% and 90, 73%). The two top priorities in research curriculum were skills in the scientific writing and critical appraisal. Between groups comparisons among trainees showed young trainees to have higher number of publications, attending larger number of educational lectures, and larger proportion reporting availability of mentorship in research training compared to older trainees. Trainees from surgical disciplines reported higher rate of lack of mentorship and higher rate of lack of interest in research training compared to other disciplines. Between group comparisons among educators showed that younger educators compared to older ones had slightly less belief that research activity will enhance their academic career, and had slightly less belief that research activity will enhance their future career. Younger educators also reported lack of skills as a barrier of research training compared to older educators. Compared to trainees educators had higher scores in the following items: research training increases clinical investigator, lack of interest as a barrier to research training, and methodology as an important component of the proposed research curriculum. By contrast trainees had higher scores in the following two areas: research training will compromise medical expert competency, and lack of protected time and lack of research questions as barriers to research training. Conclusions: The collected perceptions of trainees and educators represent the needs assessment step for research curriculum development in KFSH&amp;RC.