Board #218 - Program Innovation Incorporating User Group Views into New Course Development (Submission #9149)

Abstract

We were commissioned by the Yorkshire and Humber Deanery to create a new simulation-based course for foundation year-two doctors. We conducted a focus group interview with an aim to identify trainees’ needs, and build a new course not only based on the existent curriculum, but also on the perceived and felt needs of the trainees.

A needs analysis is the cornerstone of an educational programme development (1). Most needs analysis of felt needs is performed through surveys as they are easy to conduct. There appears to be limited use of other innovative strategies (2), such as focus group discussions to generate needs analysis for new courses development. Focus groups are ideal for generating discussions around ideas expressed (3), in order to explore perceptions in depth.

We conducted focus group discussions with an aim to create a new simulation course to fill our trainees’ needs. Clinical governance approval was obtained. Foundation year-two doctors from Hull and East Yorkshire NHS Trust were invited to attend. Eight trainees attended from a variety of placement following formal consent for participation. The facilitators framed the discussion using four questions (table 1). The discussion was transcripted and data analysed using Krueger’s framework. We designed a simulation course addressing clinical emergencies with communication challenges embedded in the simulation scenarios( table 2).

The results from the focus group were incorporated into the design of a new simulation course named "FACES," already delivered to 156 trainees. We present how these results are linked to this new course and how the post-course feedback received validates and confirms the focus group results. 98% of the course participants reported the course as "extremely relevant to their needs," 96% "very useful to their daily work," and 98% "the best training day they have had so far." We have demonstrated that stakeholder input prior to conception of a course are vital for the success of the course. One could argue that a single focus group interview is not enough for obtaining reliable results, but this problem was reduced by inviting trainees from different specialities/domains, and also different hospital placements. We believe that focus group interviews should be adopted more widely for ascertaining views of participants to support new course development.

1. Lockyer J. Needs Assessment: Lessons Learned. J Cont Educ Health Prof 1998;18:190-192.

2. Norman GR, Shannon SI, Marrin ML. The need for needs assessment in continuing medical education. Brit Med J 2004 Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.328.7446.999.

3. Krueger, RA, Casey, MA. Focus groups: A practical guide for applied researchers (3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2000.

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