Abstract
BackgroundA major challenge for clinical supervisors is to encourage their residents to be independent without jeopardising patient safety. Residents’ preferences according to level of training on this regard have not been completely explored. This study has sought to investigate which teaching methods of the Cognitive Apprenticeship (CA) model junior, intermediate and senior residents preferred and why, and how these preferences differed between groups.MethodsWe invited 301 residents of all residency programmes of Javeriana University, Bogotá, Colombia, to participate. Each resident was asked to complete a Maastricht Clinical Teaching Questionnaire (MCTQ), which, being based on the teaching methods of CA, asked residents to rate the importance to their learning of each teaching method and to indicate which of these they preferred the most and why.ResultsA total of 215 residents (71 %) completed the questionnaire. All concurred that all CA teaching methods were important or very important to their learning, regardless of their level of training. However, the reasons for their preferences clearly differed between groups: junior and intermediate residents preferred teaching methods that were more supervisor-directed, such as modelling and coaching, whereas senior residents preferred teaching methods that were more resident-directed, such as exploration and articulation.ConclusionsThe results indicate that clinical supervision (CS) should accommodate to residents’ varying degrees of development by attuning the configuration of CA teaching methods to each level of residency training. This configuration should initially vest more power in the supervisor, and gradually let the resident take charge, without ever discontinuing CS.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12909-015-0462-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
A major challenge for clinical supervisors is to encourage their residents to be independent without jeopardising patient safety
The medical education literature worldwide seems to embrace the view that clinical residency training should promote progressive independence, implying a corresponding phasing out of supervision, even though there is no empirical evidence regarding the effectiveness of this approach [1]
Setting and participants The study was conducted at San Ignacio Hospital, the main academic centre of Javeriana University in Bogotá, Colombia
Summary
A major challenge for clinical supervisors is to encourage their residents to be independent without jeopardising patient safety. The benefits of supervision have been lauded in numerous publications on medical education [6, 7] and various guidelines for effective supervision in both undergraduate and postgraduate settings have been published [8]. These frameworks envisage CS for all students, irrespective of their level of training, and the idea of progressive independence is mostly absent [8]. It follows that little is known about how supervisors should adapt their teaching methods or behaviours to residents’ varying levels of experience and expertise
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
