Methodological quality of teaching communication skills to undergraduate medical students: a mapping review

Enhancing audiology students' understanding of person-centered care: insights from an multi-national virtual student conference

OBJECTIVE

This project sought to investigate the impact of a multi-national peer learning initiative in facilitating a student-led conference on person-centred care (PCC). The primary objective was to assess students' comprehension of PCC elements before and after engaging in the opportunity, with a concurrent evaluation of the efficacy of the opportunity.

DESIGN

A mixed-methods study protocol was followed. Following the conference, participants completed a four-part survey including (a) demographics, (b) retrospective pre-post Likert scale, (c) Likert rating of conference experience and (d) five open-ended questions.

STUDY SAMPLE

One hundred and four participants (92.4% female) with a mean age of 21 years (0.07 SD) participated in the study.

RESULTS

A significant difference in awareness pre-post conference was demonstrated across all topics (WSR, p < 0.001) with participants satisfied with the conference. Qualitative analysis revealed three main themes: (a) application of PCC; (b) perspectives of PCC; and () barriers to PCC; with nine sub-themes.

CONCLUSION

The conference was beneficial in enhancing students' awareness of topics and principles of PCC. Innovative pedagogical approaches should be considered in order to enhance healthcare education allowing future clinicians to better meet the dynamic needs of their clients.

Teaching perspectives on the communication of difficult news of genetic conditions to medical students

Informing parents that their child has a diagnosis of Down syndrome (DS) is a common example of the delivery of unexpected or difficult news. Expectations and life planning will change, and if detected prenatally, discussions might include the option of pregnancy termination. Medical school curricula currently include training in breaking unexpected news; however, it is difficult to teach and assess. We use the perspectives of clinicians, educators, and a medical student who is the parent of a child with DS to frame a discussion on teaching, practicing, and assessing communication of difficult news in human genetics during medical school.

Training in communication and emotion handling skills for students attending medical school: Relationship with empathy, emotional intelligence, and attachment style

OBJECTIVE

To describe the Emoty-Com training, its impact on medical students' attitudes towards doctors' emotions and to explore the association between students' empathy, emotional intelligence (EI), and attachment style (AS) with post-training performance scores.

METHODS

The 16-hour Emoty-Com training was delivered to all second-year medical students of Verona and Milan (Italy) Universities. At pre-training, students filled out three questionnaires assessing empathy, AS and EI and responded to three questions on attitudes towards doctors' emotions in the doctor-patient encounter. The same three questions and a final evaluation test were proposed at post-training.

RESULTS

264 students participated in the study. The training reduced students' worry about managing emotions during doctor-patient relationships. Gender was associated with specific subscales of empathy, EI, and AS. Final performance scores were associated with students' attitudes towards emotions but not with empathy, EI, and AS.

CONCLUSION

The Emoty-Com training increased students' self-efficacy in handling their own emotions during consultations. Students' performance scores were related to their attitude towards doctors' emotions in clinical encounters.

PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS

The Emoty-Com training suggests ways to teach and evaluate emotion-handling skills for medical students. Possible links between empathy, EI, AS, and the attitudes towards doctors' emotions during the years of education are highlighted.

Impact of physician-patient relationship training on medical students' interpersonal skills during simulated medical consultations: a cross-sectional study

BACKGROUND

In medicine, the patient-centered approach is based on interpersonal skills, including communication, structuring the medical interview, and empathy, which have an impact on health professionals' interpersonal relationships and the quality of care. Training courses on this issue are therefore being developed in universities. We hypothesized that specific training courses in the physician-patient relationship could improve interpersonal skills among medical students during simulated consultations and the immediate satisfaction of standardized patients.

METHODS

This cross-sectional study enrolled fourth-year medical students who participated in a simulated medical consultation session with standardized patients. The evaluation of interpersonal skills was carried out using the Four Habits Coding Scheme, producing a synthetic score out of 115 points used as the primary endpoint. Some students benefited from the training courses offered by the university or by other organizations, mainly based on communication, active listening, or patient-centered approach. A comparison was made with students from the same graduating class who had not received any training.

RESULTS

The analysis of the primary endpoint showed a difference of 5 points between the group of students who had attended at least one training course and those who did not (p = 0.001). This difference was even more marked when the students had completed several training courses, up to 14 points higher with three training courses (p = 0.001), each with positive results in different areas of the care relationship.

CONCLUSIONS

Physician-patient relationship training currently provided in initial education appears to be effective in improving interpersonal skills. A repetition of this training is necessary to increase its impact.

Effectiveness of a multifaceted intervention to improve interpersonal skills of physicians in medical consultations (EPECREM): protocol for a randomised controlled trial

INTRODUCTION

Interpersonal skills, encompassing communication and empathy, are key components of effective medical consultations. Although many organisations have implemented structured training programmes, limited evidence exists on their effectiveness in improving physician interpersonal skills. This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of a standardised, multifaceted, interpersonal skills development programme for hospital physicians.

METHODS AND ANALYSIS

This study is a prospective, randomised (with a 1:1 allocation ratio), controlled, open-label, two parallel arm, superiority trial conducted at a single university hospital. Physicians will be randomised to receive either a multifaceted training programme or no intervention. The experimental intervention combines two 4-hour training sessions, dissemination of interactive educational materials, review of video-recorded consultations and individual feedback. The primary outcome measure is the overall 4-Habits Coding Scheme score assessed by two independent raters blinded to the study arm, based on video-recorded consultations, before and after intervention. The secondary outcomes include patient satisfaction, therapeutic alliance, physician self-actualisation and the length of medical consultation.

ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION

The study protocol was approved on 21 October 2020 by the CECIC Rhône-Alpes Auvergne, Clermont-Ferrand, France (IRB 5891). All participants will provide written informed consent. Efforts will be made to release the primary results within 6 to 9 months of study completion, regardless of whether they confirm or deny the research hypothesis.

TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER

NCT04703816.

Entrustment in physician-patient communication: a modified Delphi study using the EPA approach

BACKGROUND

Competency based curricula across the globe stress on the importance of effective physician patient communication. A variety of courses have been used to train physicians for this purpose. However, few of them link competencies with practice resulting in confusions in implementation and assessment. This issue can be resolved by treating certain specific patient communication related tasks as acts of entrustment or entrustable professional activities (EPAs). In this study, we aimed to define a competency-based framework for assessing patient physician communication using the language of EPAs.

METHODS

A modified Delphi study was conducted in three stages. The first stage was an extensive literature review to identify and elaborate communication related tasks which could be treated as EPAs. The second stage was content validation by medical education experts for clarity and representativeness. The third stage was three iterative rounds of modified Delphi with predefined consensus levels. The McNemar test was used to check response stability in the Delphi Rounds.

RESULTS

Expert consensus resulted in development of 4 specific EPAs focused on physician-patient communication with their competencies and respective assessment strategies all aiming for level 5 of unsupervised practice. These include Providing information to the patient or their family about diagnosis or prognosis; Breaking Bad news to the patient or their family; Counseling a patient regarding their disease or illness; Resolving conflicts with patients or their families.

CONCLUSIONS

The EPAs for Physician-patient communication are a step toward an integrative, all-inclusive competency-based assessment framework for patient-centered care. They are meant to improve the quality of physician patient interaction by standardizing communication as a decision of entrustment. The EPAs can be linked to competency frameworks around the world and provide a useful assessment framework for effective training in patient communication. They can be integrated into any post graduate curriculum and can also serve as a self-assessment tool for postgraduate training programs across the globe to improve their patient communication curricula.

Viability of Virtual Skills-based Assessments Focused on Communication

Objective To evaluate faculty and student perceptions of and performance on virtual skills-based assessments focused on communication compared to in-person assessments.Methods In spring 2020, virtual skills-based assessments were conducted. After all assessments were completed, two 12-item questionnaires, one for students and one for the faculty members who conducted the assessment, were designed to assess perceptions of virtual skills-based assessments. The surveys were distributed via an online platform to second- and third-year (P2 and P3) pharmacy students and to faculty who had participated in a virtual skills-based assessment. Scores from the spring 2020 virtual skills-based assessment were compared to scores on the in-person skills-based assessment that took place in spring 2019.Results Of the 19 faculty and 279 students invited to participate, 18 (94.7%) faculty and 241 (86.4%) students responded. The majority of faculty (88.9%) and students (63.5%) perceived the virtual skills-based assessments to be effective at simulating an interaction. However, only 33.3% of faculty and 28.6% of students preferred the virtual environment. There was not a significant difference in student performance between in-person and virtual assessments for patient consultation and SOAP note skills.Conclusion Providing sufficient formative and summative feedback to pharmacy students is a challenge, particularly in the context of skills-based assessments. Students and faculty reported that the virtual assessment provided an opportunity for an appropriate assessment of student communication skills. However, a strong preference for using virtual skills-based assessments in the future was not observed.

Perspective matters: assessment of medical students' communication and interpersonal skills by simulated patients from the internal and external patient perspective

Background: Communication and interpersonals skills are important qualities of professionalism in medicine. In medical curricula, they are usually acquired in communication trainings and assessed in OSCEs. Studies show correlations as well as differences between communication ratings of examiners and simulated patients. In our study, simulated patients assessed medical students' communication and interpersonal skills after a consultation hour from the internal and the external patient perspective. Methods: In December 2019, 52 final-year medical students participated in a consultation hour as part of a simulated first day of residency assessment. They were assessed twice with a questionnaire for communication and interpersonal skills (ComCare) by the simulated patients: directly after each consultation from the internal perspective of the patient's view (internal perspective) and four month later from the 208 consultation videos from an external perspective of the patient's view (external perspective). All eight ComCare items were assessed on a five-point Likert scale (1=full disagreement to 5=full agreement). Differences between the item means of internal and external perspective were examined by paired t-tests. Results: Overall, significantly higher ratings were found for all ComCare items from the external perspective except for the item "Interest". Ratings for the items "Language" and "Listening" were significantly higher from the external perspective for all simulated patients. Significantly higher ratings for all items from the external perspective were observed for two simulated patients. Conclusion: Simulated patients' ratings after a conversation seem to represent a more authentic view on students' communication and interpersonal skills because of the emotionally experienced situation. The evaluation of those skills from a simulated patient perspective could be a valuable complement to communication ratings by examiners.

Should eloquence be taught as part of the undergraduate medical curriculum?

This article was migrated. The article was marked as recommended. The integration of the humanities into the medical curriculum over the past two decades has been widely adopted in the stream of communication usually within the realms of doctor-patient relationship. However, its integration within medical curriculum is inconsistent, and may only be present as an optional component in certain selected modules. The study of eloquence within medicine has not been described previously, we propose that its inclusion into the medical curricula will increase equality and diversity in medical training. We aim to debate the roles of medical humanities and the integration of eloquence into the medical curriculum. Integration of eloquence into the medical curriculum with the aim of developing written prose and oration could improve our interprofessional communication and bridge the gap for those from a wider social background accessing medicine.

Psychosocial well-being of brain cancer patients and support persons: A mapping review of study types over time

INTRODUCTION

This review examined the: (1) number of publications exploring psychosocial outcomes of adults with brain cancer and/or support persons between 1999 and 2019 and whether there has been a change in the type of research over time; and (2) proportion of intervention studies meeting Cochrane Effective Practice and Organisation of Care (EPOC) research design criteria.

METHODS

Embase, The Cochrane Library, Medline and PsycINFO databases were electronically searched January 1999 to December 2019. Articles were examined against inclusion/exclusion criteria and coded into measurement, descriptive or intervention categories. Intervention studies were assessed against the EPOC design criteria.

RESULTS

220 eligible publications were identified. The number of total publications significantly increased by an average of 1 each year (95%CI = 0.7-1.3; p < 0.001). There was no significant change in the proportion of publications by study type across three time periods. Descriptive research represented the majority within each time period. Of the 17 intervention studies, only 7(41%) met EPOC design criteria.

CONCLUSIONS

Published literature on brain cancer psychosocial outcomes has increased significantly. However, descriptive research dominates research output. To increase high-level knowledge that can guide psychosocial care of people with brain cancer, there is a need to undertake methodologically rigorous intervention trials.

A framework and toolkit of interventions to enhance reflective learning among health-care professionals: the PEARL mixed-methods study

Background

Although most health care is high quality, many patients and members of staff can recall episodes of a lack of empathy, respect or effective communication from health-care staff. In extreme form, this contributes to high-profile organisational failures. Reflective learning is a universally promoted technique for stimulating insight, constructive self-appraisal and empathy; however, its efficacy tends to be assumed rather than proven. The Patient Experience And Reflective Learning (PEARL) project has used patient and staff experience to co-design a novel reflective learning framework that is based on theories of behaviour and learning.

Objective

To create a toolkit to help health-care staff obtain meaningful feedback to stimulate effective reflective learning that will promote optimal patient-, family- and colleague-focused behaviours.

Design

A 3-year developmental mixed-methods study with four interlinked workstreams and 12 facilitated co-design meetings. The Capability, Opportunity, Motivation – Behaviour framework was used to describe factors influencing the behaviour of reflection.

Setting

This took place at five acute medical units and three intensive care units in three urban acute hospital trusts in England.

Participants

Patients and relatives, medical and nursing staff, managers and researchers took part.

Data sources

Two anonymous surveys, one for patients and one for staff, were developed from existing UK-validated instruments, administered locally and analysed centrally. Ethnographers undertook interviews and observed clinical care and reflective learning activities in the workplace, as well as in the co-design meetings, and fed back their observations in plenary workshops.

Main outcome measures

Preliminary instruments were rated by participants for effectiveness and feasibility to derive a final set of tools. These are presented in an attractively designed toolbox with multiple sections, including the theoretical background of reflection, mini guides for obtaining meaningful feedback and for reflecting effectively, guides for reflecting ‘in-action’ during daily activities, and a set of resources.

Results

Local project teams (physicians, nurses, patients, relatives and managers) chaired by a non-executive director found the quarterly reports of feedback from the patient and staff surveys insightful and impactful. Patient satisfaction with care was higher for intensive care units than for acute medical units, which reflects contextual differences, but in both settings quality of communication was the main driver of satisfaction. Ethnographers identified many additional forms of experiential feedback. Those that generated an emotional response were particularly effective as a stimulus for reflection. These sources of data were used to supplement individual participant experiences in the nine local co-design meetings and four workshops to identify barriers to and facilitators of effective reflection, focusing on capability, opportunity and motivation. A logic model was developed combining the Capability, Opportunity, Motivation – Behaviour framework for reflection and theories of learning to link patient and staff experience to changes in downstream behaviours. Participants proposed practical tools and activities to enhance reflection ‘in-action’ and ‘on-action’. These tools were developed iteratively by the local and central project teams.

Limitations

Paper-based surveys were burdensome to administer and analyse.

Conclusions

Patients and health-care staff collaborated to produce a novel reflective learning toolkit.

Future work

The toolkit requires evaluating in a cluster randomised controlled trial.

Funding

This project was funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Health Services and Delivery Research programme and will be published in full in Health Services and Delivery Research; Vol. 8, No. 32. See the NIHR Journals Library website for further project information.

Patient experience and reflective learning (PEARL): a mixed methods protocol for staff insight development in acute and intensive care medicine in the UK

INTRODUCTION

Patient and staff experiences are strongly influenced by attitudes and behaviours, and provide important insights into care quality. Patient and staff feedback could be used more effectively to enhance behaviours and improve care through systematic integration with techniques for reflective learning. We aim to develop a reflective learning framework and toolkit for healthcare staff to improve patient, family and staff experience.

METHODS & ANALYSIS

Local project teams including staff and patients from the acute medical units (AMUs) and intensive care units (ICUs) of three National Health Service trusts will implement two experience surveys derived from existing instruments: a continuous patient and relative survey and an annual staff survey. Survey data will be supplemented by ethnographic interviews and observations in the workplace to evaluate barriers to and facilitators of reflective learning. Using facilitated iterative co-design, local project teams will supplement survey data with their experiences of healthcare to identify events, actions, activities and interventions which promote personal insight and empathy through reflective learning. Outputs will be collated by the central project team to develop a reflective learning framework and toolkit which will be fed back to the local groups for review, refinement and piloting. The development process will be mapped to a conceptual theory of reflective learning which combines psychological and pedagogical theories of learning, alongside theories of behaviour change based on capability, opportunity and motivation influencing behaviour. The output will be a locally-adaptable workplace-based toolkit providing guidance on using reflective learning to incorporate patient and staff experience in routine clinical activities.

ETHICS & DISSEMINATION

The PEARL project has received ethics approval from the London Brent Research Ethics Committee (REC Ref 16/LO/224). We propose a national cluster randomised step-wedge trial of the toolkit developed for large-scale evaluation of impact on patient outcomes.

Interactional skills training in undergraduate medical education: ten principles for guiding future research

BACKGROUND

High-quality healthcare requires practitioners who have technical competence and communication skills. Medical practitioners need interpersonal skills for gathering and transferring information to their patients, in addition to general consultation skills. Appropriate information gathering increases the likelihood of an accurate diagnosis. Transferring information should be performed in a way that promotes patient understanding and increases the probability of adherence to physician recommendations. This applies to: (i) primary prevention such as smoking cessation; (ii) secondary prevention including preparation for potentially threatening interventions; and (iii) tertiary care, including breaking bad news regarding treatment and prognosis.

DISCUSSION

This debate paper delineates factors associated with undergraduate medical communication skills training where robust research is needed. Ten key principles are presented and discussed, which are intended to guide future research in this field and ensure high quality studies with methodological rigour are conducted. The literature on communication skills training for medical school undergraduates continues to grow. A considerable portion of this output is represented by commentaries, descriptive studies or poorly designed interventions. As with any field of healthcare, quality research interventions are required to ensure practice is grounded in high-level evidence.