Resident Competence, Morale, and Psychiatric Training: III. Resident-Staff Agreement

Abstract

The authors surveyed faculty, residents, and training directors from 59 training programs in order to 1) determine which factors affect faculty members’ perceptions of program supportiveness to residents and 2) to compare faculty and resident perceptions of the training program milieu. Results indicate that faculty perceive their training programs as significantly more supportive than do residents. Faculty tenure, age, sex, rank, degree (MD vs. Ph.D.) and years of experience are positively related to perceptions of program supportiveness. Also, chairpersons and training directors describe their training programs as being significantly more supportive than do other faculty. Agree-ment between residents’ and staffs perceptions increases with residents’ advanced PGY status and recency of faculty’s completion of residency training. Results suggest that systematic measurements of both residents’ and staffs perceptions of the training program milieu might be used to better assess the value of program characteristics, enhance the quality of training environments, and eventually increase residents’ competence and program satisfaction.