A RANDOMIZED MULTICENTER TRIAL TO IMPROVE RESIDENT TEACHING WITH WRITTEN FEEDBACK

Background: Residents have all important role as teachers of medical s tudents. Purpose: This study addressed assessment of the impact of wri tten learner feedback on resident teaching. Methods: Senior residents (N = 30) were randomized into either an experimental group receiving f eedback or a control group receiving no feedback. Team members were in terviewed to identify the residents' teaching strengths and weaknesses , and rate residents on overall teaching effectiveness and on eight sp ecific teaching characteristics. Residents received a one-page summary of interview comments and mean rating scores for three consecutive ro tations. Results: Over a 1-year period, there was a significant differ ence between the mean group ratings for the reaching characteristics E stablishes Rapport (p<.01) and Provides Direction and Feedback (p<.05) . Overall Teaching Effectiveness tended to improve for the experimenta l group over the year and remain stable for the control group (p=.07). Conclusions: Written feedback to senior residents may improve their t eaching. This minimally intensive method may be a useful alternate or complement to other approaches supporting resident teaching.