Encourage consistent and accurate reporting by faculty on evaluations
At HCPro’s 3rd Annual Residency Program Management Workshop in Chicago, many program directors and coordinators lamented over the troubles they have getting faculty to report poor performance on resident evaluations. The October and November issues of Residency Program Alert included articles explaining what prevents faculty from completing accurate evaluations and tips on how to help faculty become better evaluators.
In addition to the excuses covered in the articles– I don’t want to be the bad guy, I don’t have enough examples to prove they’re deficient in this skill, evaluations are a pain to fill out– there are two more reasons why faculty choose not to accurately fill out reports.
First, faculty really need to know that the residents they fail will have a chance of remediation, say Nancy Dudek, MD, FRCPC, MEd, assistant professor, faculty of medicine and Meridith Marks, MD, FRCPC, MEd, associate professor and assistant dean for the Academy of Innovation in Medical Education, at the University of Ottawa in Ontario.
If they do not know if there is a remediation plan, what it is, and who is in charge of that, faculty tend to hold back and pass the resident. Dudek and Marks suggest simply educating staff on what your program’s remediation process is for residents who fail a rotation.
The appeals process can also deter faculty members from failing residents. They know that if a resident appeals, it will take up a lot of their time. Faculty members may be hesitant to fail a resident because it will result in more meetings, letters, and paperwork, says Dudek.
Overcoming this obstacle is difficult because, well, appeal processes are unpleasant. However, if residency programs have the proper documentation, including evaluations that reflect that a resident did perform below standards, then it should not be so long and drawn out.
Marks and Dudek have studied faculty evaluation and have written two papers on the topic that are definitely worth reading. Check them out:
Failure to Fail: The Perspectives of Clinical Supervisors. Academic Medicine, Vol. 80, No. 10/October 2005 Supplement.
Assessing the quality of supervisors’ completed clinical evaluation reports. Medical Education 2008; 42: 816-822.
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Our Program also requires comment on grades at the high end of the scale as well. If on a scale of 1-9, a resident gets all 9’s, faculty are encouraged to provide reasoning and what prompted the high marks.
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