The Professional Development Student Forum (PDSF) can professional development be taught to final year medical students?
Creators: name: Woodun, Heerani
Publisher: name: F1000 Research Limited
Year: 2024

description: Background<br>
Working in partnership with patients, listening and responding to their concerns and preferences is the important professionalism and professional values and behaviour domain of Good Medical Practice. This is hard to integrate in a university curriculum. Maximising its educational impact on final year AP2 Nottingham University medical students, leading to positive changes in their clinical practice, is the aim of a new Professional Development Student Forum (PDSF) programme. We describe the methods, content, intended learning outcomes and assessment methods of our new curriculum and feedback from students as well as further developments.<br>
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Summary of Work<br>
At the start of each AP2 rotation, a student ‘perspective’ survey with Likert-scale and open-ended questions was undertaken, covering the purpose, usefulness, proactivity and understanding of PDSF sessions. The 4 once-weekly PDSF sessions comprised of case-based scenarios on mental capacity act/Deprivation of Liberty, Consenting/needlestick injury management, Ethical pillars/DNAR, Duty of Candour/Medially Unexplained Symptoms which corresponded with weekly themes. Delivery included a combination of open unstructured platform when students bring up challenging cases, followed by a structured small group discussions and role-playing using powerpoint slides and hardcopy resources including the SPIKES framework with peer to peer and educator feedback. The curriculum was made inclusive. A post ‘perspective’ survey and pre and post ‘ethical knowledge’ quizzes were undertaken.<br>
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Summary of Results<br>
40 pre and post ‘perspective’ responses were obtained. There were improvements from about 50% to about 80% in each of: understanding the purpose of PDSF, professional and ethical issues faced and usefulness to clinical practice and patient safety. Only 12% felt discouraged to actively look for professional/ethical cases compared to the initial 42%. Students liked structured ethical scenarios discussed in the safe PDSF environment. Good facilitators, relevance to exams and future clinical practice increased student satisfaction. Role playing was deemed effective by 65%. 2 dissatisfaction responses were obtained around role-playing. Improvement in the ethical knowledge quiz was demonstrated. Evaluation and Feedback was sought from educators across different specialties.<br>
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Discussion and Conclusion<br>
Structured PDSF sessions are relevant, useful and a safe environment. However, they may deter students from bringing their cases for discussion which should remain the priority. Different educators and learners are variable factors. Effort to standardise sessions across educators with video training is recommended. Suggested adaptations include inclusive preparatory learning materials, adding career developmental and professional scenarios involving colleagues, using other rotations and years to reduce cognitive load (a new 3rd year programme is being implemented), use of virtual reality for scenarios, implementing a summative assessment in the form of a reflection and Professionalism OSCE circuit with an award of Professionalism Competency Certificate. Such a curriculum has been proposed to the Nottingham University Medical School, and it could be applied nationally.<br>
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Take Home Message<br>
Structured weekly Professional Development Student Forums, as a safe open debriefing and learning platform for ethical and professional issues, are indispensable to final year medical students. A summative Professionalism OSCE circuit could justify awarding a Professionalism Competency Certificate.