Introduction of structured feedback for MBBS students: Perception of students and faculty

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: Feedback is an important part of the assessment process. However, one-to-one structured and constructive feedback to the students is not practiced mostly due to lack of practice and feasibility issues. The present study was conducted to understand the perception of students and faculty toward one-to-one structured feedback. METHODOLOGY: All the 3 rd MBBS professional students were included in the study. An orientation was given to the faculty regarding the importance of feedback and how to give structured feedback. A standardized format was provided to the faculty for providing the feedback to the students. After completion of the assessments, a one-to-one structured verbal feedback was given to all the students. Thereafter, faculty and student's perception on the feedback process was obtained through questionnaires. A focused group discussion was also conducted among the students. RESULTS: A total of 42 students participated in the study out of 50. A positive response was received from all the students regarding the feedback. Nearly84.34% of the students acknowledged that feedback is important for understanding their mistakes, 92.84% of the students responded positively that feedback helps to build a good rapport with the teacher, and 92.85% of the students reported that they were satisfied with the overall experience of receiving feedback. Most of the faculty (80%) perceived that giving feedback after the assessment was a good idea. The faculty felt motivated to give feedback to the students after the hands-on experience. However, only 20% of the faculty agreed that the process of feedback was easy to carry out (mean score: 2.2 ± 1.09). CONCLUSION: The positive responses received from both the students and the faculty highlight that the students are receptive toward feedback provided it is structured, constructive, and helps them to achieve their learning goals.

Feedback: Different Concepts and Practices in a Culturally Different Environment-Faculty Perceptions

“…Another factor that affected feedback practices was time; clinical teachers expressed not having enough time to give more detailed responses to performance, even though they repeatedly expressed to students that they could be approached at any given time. This is similar to findings of a recent study by Bhattacharyya where time and work constraints were identified as major barriers to giving effective feedback 19 . However, in a study by Al-Hattami most teachers and students did not see that time, feasibility, amotivation or uncaring attitude towards students could be deemed a barrier to not providing constructive feedback 20 .…”

Assessing Residents in the Department of Surgery at a Tertiary Care Centre Using Mini-Clinical Evaluation Exercise (Mini-CEX)

“…According to a research, feedback content has the potential to enhance mini-CEX's usefulness as an assessment tool and provide both constructive and critical feedback [ 29 ]. Positive feedback about the use of mini-CEX in many areas of medical education has been received by numerous other researchers [ 4 , 21 , 30 , 31 ].…”

“…Similarly, constructive feedback from both the assessor and the student has been shown to have an impact on a student’s education [ 30 ]. Thus, mini‑CEX supports feedback which can improve the performances of the trainee, though leniency of assessors might limit the identification of trainees who underperform [ 31 ].…”

Mini clinical evaluation exercise (Mini-CEX)

“…Similarly, the positive responses received from both students and faculty highlight that the students are receptive to feedback, provided it is structured, constructive, and helps them to achieve their learning goals. [ 17 ]…”