Exploring doctors’ trade-offs between management, research and clinical training in the medical curriculum : a protocol for a discrete choice experiment in Southern Africa

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Authors

Turner, Astrid Chrisilda
Wolvaardt, Jacqueline Elizabeth (Liz)
Ryan, Mandy

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

BMJ Publishing Group

Abstract

INTRODUCTION : Medical curricula should prepare doctors for roles that extend beyond that of a clinician. But the formal inclusion of both management and research training still appear to be neglected. It is important to understand what the profession would be willing to give up in terms of clinical training time for management and research content teaching prior to making any changes in a medical curriculum METHODS AND ANALYSIS : A discrete choice experiment will elicit the preferences and trade-offs that medical doctors in Southern Africa are prepared to make about the management, research, and clinical training. Attention will also be given to the teaching method and placement of the content. DCE data will be collected using an online survey with an estimated sample size of 368 medical doctors. Data regarding participants’ preference for a traditional or revised curriculum will be assessed using the Resistance to Change-Beliefs (RC-B) scale and demographic information will also be collected to assess preference heterogeneity. Analysis of the DCE data will be based on the Random Utility Maximisation framework using variants of the multinomial logit model. Data quality will be assessed. Value will be estimated in terms of clinical time, that is, how much clinical training time medical doctors are willing to give up to have research and management training within a curriculum that has a maximum of 40 hours per week. Observed preference heterogeneity will be assessed using the RC-B scale data and the characteristics of respondents. Latent class models will be used to test for unobserved heterogeneity. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION : The research ethics and institutional committees of the sites have approved the study. The survey includes an informed consent section. Study findings will be reported to the medical schools and papers will be submitted to peer-reviewed, accredited journals and higher education and health economic conferences.

Description

DATA AVAILABILITY : The pilot study data is available as supplementary information. Data collection is still in progress for the study.

Keywords

Medical curricula, Management training, Research training, Medical doctors, Southern Africa, Clinical training, SDG-04: Quality education

Sustainable Development Goals

SDG-04:Quality Education

Citation

Turner, A., Wolvaardt, J. & Ryan, M. Exploring doctors’ trade-offs between management, research and clinical training in the medical curriculum: a protocol for a discrete choice experiment in Southern Africa. BMJ Open 2023;13:e070836. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2022-070836.