IMPROVING RESIDENTS CONFIDENCE IN USING PSYCHOSOCIAL SKILLS

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate an intensive training program's effects on resi dents' confidence in their ability in, anticipation of positive outcom es from, and personal commitment to psychosocial behaviors, DESIGN: Co ntrolled randomized study, SETTING: A university- and community-based primary care residency training program, PARTICIPANTS: 26 first-year r esidents in internal medicine and family practice, INTERVENTION: The r esidents were randomly assigned to a control group or to one-month int ensive training centered on psychosocial skills needed in primary care , MEASUREMENTS: Questionnaires measuring knowledge of psychosocial med icine, and self-confidence in, anticipation of positive outcomes from, and personal commitment to five skill areas: psychological sensitivit y, emotional sensitivity, management of somatization, and directive an d nondirective facilitation of patient communication, RESULTS: The tra ined residents expressed higher self-confidence in all five areas of p sychosocial skill (p < 0.03 for all tests), anticipated more positive outcomes for emotional sensitivity(p = 0.05), managing somatization (p = 0.03), and nondirectively facilitating patient communication (p = 0 .02), and were more strongly committed to being emotionally sensitive (p = 0.055) and managing somatization (p = 0.056), compared with the u ntrained residents, The trained residents also evidenced more knowledg e of psychosocial medicine than did the untrained residents (p < 0.001 ). CONCLUSIONS: Intensive psychosocial training improves residents' se lf-confidence in their ability regarding key psychosocial behaviors an d increases their knowledge of psychosocial medicine, Training also in creases anticipation of positive outcomes from and personal commitment to some, but not all, psychosocial skills.