In 2008, specialist paediatric registrars in all hospitals in the West Midlands Deanery were asked to complete the JEST trainee questionnaire to evaluate their current post.
The trainer questionnaire contained questions about six independent variables: self-efficacy, task perception, neuroticism, extraversion, agreeableness and conscientiousness, and the trainee questionnaire contained questions about the three dependent variables: frequency, quality of content and consequential impact of the feedback process.
The aim of this iterative study was i) to develop a new simple one page trainee questionnaire based on the GMC standards for postgraduate medical education ii) to look at the reliability and validity of the questionnaire as a tool for assessing postgraduate training posts with comparison to a well established and internationally validated tool, PHEEM.
This difficulty, subsequently supported by the three 2013 reports into quality and safety of the NHS [ 1– 3] confirmed our belief that a simple local monitoring process, measuring good educational practice requires a local trainee questionnaire for each post in a training year.
The aim of this study was to develop a simple trainee questionnaire for evaluation of postgraduate training posts based on the GMC, UK standards and to look at the reliability and validity including comparison with a well-established and internationally validated tool, the Postgraduate Hospital Educational Environment Measure (PHEEM).
In 2007, Foundation Year One and Foundation Year Two doctors (doctors in their first two years of postgraduate training) in 2 hospitals in the West Midlands Deanery (Walsall and Sandwell) were asked to complete the JEST trainee questionnaire to evaluate their current post.
To check for differences in (trainer) responders and (trainer) non-responders we used the data of the trainees' questionnaire and compared the results of trainees whose trainer did not respond with the answers of trainees whose trainers did respond.
The trainees completed five questionnaires: ▪ Personal characteristics: besides sex, age and year of graduation, we asked the trainees about the previously attended EBM related courses, research experience, and how many years of experience they had in research and practice.
Trainers and trainees answered different questionnaires.
In total, 189 of 450 medical trainees completed the questionnaires with a response rate of 42%.
