Assessment of Psychiatry Trainees Satisfaction towards Postgraduate Psychiatry Clinical MD in Sudan

Abstract

Background Assessment of trainees and graduate’s satisfaction in medical education and clinical training is an important guide for the improvement of educational and training programs. Local information is scarce on psychiatry trainees' satisfaction to their training program. Objective To assess psychiatry trainees satisfaction towards postgraduate program in Clinical MD in Psychiatry at the Sudan Medical Specialization Board in 2021. Method This is a cross-sectional observational study conducted at the Sudan Medical Specialization Board / psychiatry council/ Clinical MD in Psychiatry program, within the period from August 2021 to January 2022. 137 of current psychiatry trainees and graduates were surveyed using a closed-ended unipolar 5 grade Likert’s scale, through adapted a self -administered questionnaire covering eight dimensions and variety of psychiatry training items. Areas covered were curriculum coverage, research involvement and training assessment methods, clinical experiences, academic experiences, supervision, training centers support and training environment. Result The overall trainee's satisfaction with the provided training program was reported in 35%. The satisfaction score was observed to be more common in the graduates (62%) compared to the current trainees (38%). The areas of good satisfaction include: training in adult general psychiatry (69.6%), diversity of patients' population (72%), part-1 exam (77.5%) and level of support from peers (75.2%). while areas of low level satisfaction include: quality of physical facilities(10.4%),education prioritization over service(11.2%) training in psychiatry subspecialties(12.6%), learning resources(13.6%), safety of environment(14.2%). overall research experiences(21.9%), academic activity at training centers(24.8%), organization of learning activities(24.8%), responsiveness of program to feedback from residents(24%), frequency of supervision received(30.4%) continuous assessment(36.4%), received constructive feedback(37.6%) and training in emergency room(40%). Conclusion The frequency of satisfaction was found to be alarmingly low among psychiatry trainees in the variety of training constructs used in the study, and the results were in agreement with many international studies.