Acute Intervention To Foster Reflection On Reciprocity In Relationships Increased Participants’ Patient- Or Student-Centered Orientation Scores In Association With A Medical Biochemistry Course

Abstract

PurposeUsing an intervention to foster student and faculty awareness of the reciprocal influence of relationships, the authors measured whether participants’ patientor student-centered orientation scores improved following the intervention.MethodOne hundred seventy three first-year medical students and 64 faculty members participated in one of seven nearly identical, twohour seminars on relationship-centeredness including reflective writing, reading and small group discussion of the reflections. We conducted student sessions near the end of the second academic quarter of student training in February 2008. Students’ patient-centered orientation scores, obtained on two occasions prior to the intervention, were compared to those completed immediately following the intervention and near the ends of the first and second years of medical training. The authors collected faculty student-centered orientation scores immediately prior to and following the intervention.ResultsWhile students’ patientcentered orientation scores decreased somewhat during their first quarter of medical school, their scores improved significantly immediately after the intervention near the end of the second quarter of school. Faculty members’ student-centered orientation scores also improved after the intervention. The improvement in students’ scores eroded completely by the end of the first year and continued to deteriorate during the second year of medical school. ConclusionsAlthough encouraging, the effects of our intervention proved temporary, possibly in the context of a non-supportive hidden curriculum. It remains to be determined whether regular use of interventions, like the one in this study, or other changes in the cultures and curricula of medical education might sustain higher relationship-centered orientations in students, faculty and staff.