Problems and perceived needs for medical ethics education of resident physicians in Alexandria teaching hospitals, Egypt

Educational content of professional ethics in postgraduate dental education

PURPOSE

Inclusion of proper educational content with respect to professional ethics in dental curricula is an important step to achieve objectives of ethics education especially in postgraduate programs when the time and opportunities for explicit instruction of ethics are limited. This study aimed to find and discuss the topics of ethics and professionalism for dental postgraduate programs.

METHODS

A modified Delphi survey of experts' opinions with three rounds was conducted to establish a consensus on the need to teach professional ethics topics. The topics were identified through a literature review and according to the opinion of the experts. Items scored as highly important by over 80% of the participants in each round of the survey were considered educational needs.

RESULTS

A total of 154 ethical issues were identified and classified into 29 topical categories to design the initial questionnaire. A consensus was developed on 24 ethics and professionalism topics for inclusion in the professional ethics curriculum for all dental postgraduate programs.

CONCLUSIONS

Based on the results of this study, the same educational content in professional ethics is needed for all dental residency programs in all specialties. Most of the topics on which experts reached a consensus to be included in the ethics educational content were related to ethical and professional standards of conduct.

Needs assessment of ethics and communication teaching for neonatal perinatal medicine programs in Canada

Objective

To explore ethics education needs in Canadian Neonatal Perinatal Medicine (NPM) training programs.

Methods

A retrospective review of NPM trainees' performance at the National NPM Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) was undertaken for 2012 to 2017 and two distinct cross-sectional online surveys were carried out. One survey targeted recently graduated neonatologists (RGNs) who completed 2 years' training in a Canadian NPM program between 2010 and 2015; the other survey was sent to Canadian NPM training program directors (PDs). The domains of interest were: perception of education, ethics and communication topics, educational strategies, assessment of trainees' competencies, and barriers to neonatal ethics education.

Results

NPM trainees generally performed less well in stations involving ethics and communication relative to other domains on the National OSCE. Forty-seven RGNs (44.3%) and 12 PDs (92.3%) completed the survey. Over 90% of PDs and RGNs agreed on the importance of training in ethics and communication. Both groups highly valued training on topics related to communication. Preferred teaching strategies were experiential: observation and feedback. PDs mentioned the importance of using validated tools to regularly and formally assess trainees. They recognized challenges in regard to financial resources, physical space, and faculty training in patient-physician communication.

Conclusions

National OSCE results indicate the need to improve neonatal ethics and communication training in Canadian NPM programs. RGNs and PDs identified important topics, as well as teaching and evaluation strategies. These results can be used to develop a training program for ethics and communication in NPM.