4I1 (University College Cork, Medical Education Unit, Cork,Ireland)
Does professionalism decline over the courseof medical education? Professionalism profiling usingquantitative tools in an integrated medical curriculum
Background: Research has shown that professionalismdeclines over the course of undergraduate training.Recent curriculum reform should stem such trends.
Summary of work: To measure student attitudes toprofessionalism; specifically teamwork, empathy, lifelonglearning and reflective practice, following theintroduction of an integrated curriculum. All students inYear 1-5, of a 5 year program and Year 2-3 of 4 yeargraduate entry completed a series of validatedquestionnaires. This included Jefferson Scale ofPhysician Empathy, Jefferson Scale of Physician LifelongLearning, Self-reflection and insight scale & Readinessfor Inter-professional Learning Scale (RIPLS). Data wasanalyzed in SPSS.
Summary of results: Our response rate was 73% (487).54% of the respondents were female. Age range is 17¿40 years. Irish students accounted for 55% of thesample. The mean empathy score was 97.56 (range 57-114, SD 6.79); the mean life-long learning score was43.85 (range 28-56,SD5.01), the mean RIPLS score was78.33 (range 23-94, SD9.24). There is no significantdeterioration in empathy score between year 1 to year5. The lifelong learning scores increased significantlybetween year one and year 5 (p<0.001). The RIPLSdeclined significantly (p<0.01) between year 1 and year5.
Conclusions: Quantitative measures of professionalismvaried throughout the course, emphasising thecomplex nature of professionalism.
4I2 Medical Professionalism in Relations: