DOI: 10.5061/dryad.xd2547dg9
title: Qualification and teaching of peer-student tutors in undergraduate medical education: Does it affect the understanding and acquiring of CanMEDS competencies?

description: Objective: The Canadian Medical Education Directives for
 Specialists (CanMEDS), described by scientists of the Royal College of
 Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, specify the competencies that medical
 students should acquire during their studies of human medicine. These
 include the skills of Medical Expert, Communicator, Collaborator, Manager,
 Professional, Health Advocate and Scholar. We investigated the opinion of
 former student tutors that are currently active as clinical residents to
 understand whether they acquired and applied the CanMEDS competencies more
 during their student tutoring activities or during their undergraduate
 medical training. Methods: An online questionnaire with closed and open
 questions were distributed to residents with work experience as student
 tutors. A Likert scale was used to assess the relevance of each CanMEDS
 competency to their current employment and to evaluate the acquisition and
 application of each CanMEDS competency during undergraduate medical
 training in comparison to their peer-student tutor employment. We used the
 sign test for identify significant differences in the acquisition and
 application of CanMEDS competencies. Results: Of one hundred and
 twenty-three tutors, twenty-four met the inclusion criteria and fourteen
 questionnaires were returned. Concerning acquiring the CanMEDS roles
 Collaborator, Communicator, Professional and Manager there was a
 significant difference in favour of peer-student tutor employment. Nearly
 all participants indicated that they noticed a general benefit from having
 worked as peer-student tutors. Conclusion: We found that
 employment as a peer-student tutor is beneficial for the respondents in
 general and for the acquisition and application of several CanMEDS roles
 in particular.
description: The
 questionnaire applied was based on a previously published tool (7) and was
 modified according to study aims and consisted of six parts:
 1) general information and demographical data, 2) information on former
 peer-student tutor employment, 3) information on current residency
 employment, 4) relevance of CanMEDS roles in daily activities as a
 resident, 5) CanMEDS roles acquired and applied in undergraduate medical
 training in general, and 6) CanMEDS roles specifically acquired and
 applied during employment at the Skills and Simulation Centre. Parts 4
 thru 6 asked for a subjective assessment; for rating, a five-point Likert
 scale was used (CanMEDS professional roles were 1= fully acquired, 2=
 somewhat acquired, 3=neutral, 4=mostly not acquired, 5=not acquired at
 all). The
 questionnaire was set up using EvaSys® software (version 7.1 Lueneburg,
 Germany). Data were analyzed descriptively
 and statistically using SPSS (version 12, Stanford, USA). For analysis of
 acquisition and application of CanMEDS roles, the sign-test was
 used. For data
 management and analysis of open-ended questions, MaxQDA software (version
 12, Berlin, Germany) and Excel (version 2019) were used. Categorization
 and response frequency analysis was performed according to predefined
 principles (8): 1) categorization choice corresponds to the aim of the
 study, 2) categories are independent, clearly defined, complete and
 uniform, and 3) coding is conducted by two independent
 individuals. Analysis was
 based on establishing several categories (codes) to combine segments from
 participant responses and as a final step, to quantify
 the categorical responses. With a
 reliability of 87%, the elements of each open question were assigned to
 the defined categories by two independent
 researchers.
description: Only the answers to the questions that were used for the study
 were uploaded. In the columns of the tables it is noted
 if the question was not answered by the participants.
 Definition of terms: POL - Problem-Oriented
 Learning OSCE - Objective Structured Clinical
 Examination 0 = participant has not answered