Assessment of medical professionalism is often challenged by the subjectivity of its construct and
lack of feedback practice to nurture professional growth. However transmitting professionalism alone
has not been shown to improve professional behaviour therefore professionalism need to be assessed
if it is viewed as relevant. The authors provided description and guidelines on the use of Simplified
Thematic Engagement of Professionalism Scale (STEPS) as summative and formative assessment
tool for assessing professionalism attributes. STEPS was developed based on the Professionalism
Mini-Evaluation Exercise (P-MEX) format that utilise multiple short encounter assessment and
incorporated professionalism values from a local study. The formative component has 15 attributes
that were categorised into personal, profession, patient and public. This is assessed using seven scale
rubric that promotes feedback practice using feed up, feed back and feed forward concept. The
summative component utilises global rating that will be collated longitudinally to form a more robust
evaluation of student professionalism. Current investigations are ongoing especially to ascertain the
usability and validity of STEPS as peer assessment and self-assessment tool.
Introduction: Clinical educators around the globe agreed that an optimal educational climate is a vital aspect for effective learning to take place. This study was conducted to evaluate the perceptions of graduates toward the quality of clinical education climate in USM medical school. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted on a cohort of USM medical graduates. Questionnaires were administered to the graduates to measure their perception on four aspects of clinical education climate that include structure of clinical rotation, clinical teaching and learning activities, quality of lecturers and end clinical rotation assessment across 13 clinical rotations. The graduates were requested to respond to seven-Likert scale ranging from 1(poor) to 7(excellent). Scores of equal to or more than 5 was considered as positive areas, scores of between 4 and 5 were considered as areas for improvement, and scores less than 4 were considered as areas of concern. Data analysis was performed using SPSS version 20. Results: A total of 105 (96.3%) graduates responded to the questionnaire. Results showed only the paediatric rotation obtained positive ratings on all areas of the clinical rotation structure. With regards to teaching and learning activities, the graduates scored most of the clinical rotations between 4 and 5. With regards to the quality of lecturers, most of the clinical rotations obtained score more than 5. Most of the areas related to the end-of-assessment of clinical rotation obtained score more than 5 except for the feedback adequacy, indicating inadequacy of feedback they received. Conclusion: USM medical graduates positively perceived the quality of lecturers during clinical training, however several areas of clinical education related to clinical rotation structure, clinical teaching and learning activities, and feedback practice were perceived by them as areas for improvement. Medical schools should introduce strategic measures to address the concerns raised by the graduates to ensure the best clinical learning experience are provided to the current and future medical students.
Educational environment is an important determinant of medical students’ behaviour. It impacts their
academic performance, motivation, and psychological well-being. Quantitative evidence have shown
that there is a decrease in the positive perception of clinical medical students towards the educational
environment. The primary focus on this study was to explore the clinical education environment
through the lived experience of clinical medical students during medical training. Using hermeneutic
phenomenology we aimed to interpret participants’ experience of personal clinical learning journey
through free text input. Thematic analysis was performed to analyse the written texts. Various
measures were taken to enhance the trustworthiness of the findings. A total of 154 (74.8%) fourth year
students and 144 (74.6%) final year students participated in the study. We identified six overarching
themes of education environment in clinical setting that are personal development, teaching and
learning, assessment for learning, facility, support and nurturing curriculum. The overlapping
relationship of the themes is illustrated in the Clinical Education Environment Framework. While
many themes were consistent with existing framework, our findings also proposed assessment as an
important component to influence perception on education environment. The themes in this study
finding conform to the definition of education environment which covers physical, social, and
psychological aspects of students learning. Medical schools should take active measures to incorporate
a nurturing education environment especially in clinical year where students struggle with the hidden
curriculum.