EVALUATION OF A COMPUTER TRACKING PROGRAM FOR RESIDENT-PATIENT ENCOUNTERS

OBJECTIVE To examine the effectiveness of a formal tracking system for residents' clinical experiences. DESIGN We examined three shifts, sel ected at random, for each resident (without residents' knowledge) duri ng emergency rotations. Information from patient charts was compared w ith residents' computerized records for rotation (location and precept or) and patient (age, sex, diagnosis, and procedure) information. SETT ING The Northeastern Ontario Family Medicine Program, a program design ed to provide remote, rural, and northern resident experience. PARTICI PANTS First-, second-, and third-year residents on emergency rotations in the academic years 1992 to 1994. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Compliance, reliability, and validity of tracking records. RESULTS Residents reco rded patient encounters 88% of the time. Compliance with rotation info rmation was high (100% rotation, 94% preceptor). Agreement on patient age and sex was high. Procedure compliance was somewhat lower (83%). I ntrarater reliability (91%) and inter-rater reliability (78%) are acce ptably high, as is validity when compared with a gold standard entry ( 88%). CONCLUSIONS Regular entry of reliable and valid data is facilita ted by the computerized resident-patient encounter tracking program. T his computer tool should prove useful for multilevel program evaluatio n in the future.