Experience of observation skill workshop intervention for ophthalmologists in fellowship training

Abstract

Background To gauge the impact of an interventional workshop conducted to measure the observation skills of 34 postgraduates during induction into an ophthalmology fellowship. Methods A seven-hour workshop was conducted with the ophthalmology trainees. Trainees from the 2022 batch of ophthalmology fellowships (21 females and 13 males) were included in the study. The pre-workshop assessment comprised two non-clinical images to spot the difference and five clinical images from various subspecialties of ophthalmology. This was followed by workshop and Post workshop assessment. The pre- and post-observation grades of participants were then compared by masked ophthalmologists. The Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used to compare scores at two time points, with a p-value < 0.05 for statistical significance. Results Statistical analysis revealed that the observation skill score was significantly higher after the workshop intervention (Md = 4.00, n = 34) compared to the pre-workshop score (Md = 1.85, n = 34), p-value = 0.000. Conclusions Workshops on specific/selected foundational skills, such as observation skills and communication skills, must be integrated into the curricula of basic medical degree and specialty medicine to equip medical professionals with attentive observation and deep learning.