Clinical skills training and structured internship orientation of medical interns: enhancing professionalism and quality of medical practice in Nigeria

Abstract

Fresh medical graduates undergo supervised practical training that ensured theories learnt in the classroom are applied to specific practical professional experiences. Unfortunately many of the newly qualify medical doctors do not get placement years after graduation and many start the internship positions with little or no knowledge about the goals of the training, organizational structure, decorum, expected roles and responsibilities and expected outcome of the internship.In this study we conducted administrative and clinical skills orientation trainings for freshly recruited medical graduates and evaluated the effect of the program on medical interns.All seventy four newly recruited medical graduates who were to commence internship training at the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital were invited for a five days mandatory orientation trainings and clinical skills simulation at the hospital. Base line and end line administrative and clinical skills acquisition data was collected and analyzed using SPSS version 21.Statistically significant difference was observed in the assessment of familiarization with fundamental principles of medical practice and administrative procedure. Overall Pre test mean score was 12.561±7.4307 while posttest mean score was 17.5614±7.4857 with a gain score of 5.0004 and a p value of 0.0001.The study concluded that most medical interns did not have sufficient knowledge of issues that borders on administration, hospital policies and work standard. Orientation training of medical intern on critical work and professional issues before the commencement of internship training has clearly shown gross improvement in the knowledge base on professionalism, administrative and work related standard. It is strongly recommended that mandatory orientation training be carried out for all intending medical graduates before the commencement of internship.Keywords: Internship Orientation Training Professionalism