EPAs for clinical surgical teaching skills for undergraduate medical and dental clinical teachers

Objectives: To develop desired EPAs for clinical surgical teaching skills of medical/dental teachers teaching surgery to undergraduates (knowledge, skills and attitude) through expert consensus. Methods: This study was conducted as an online and one-to-one consensus survey, It involved the experts meeting inclusion criteria serving as clinical teachers teaching surgery to undergraduates. They serve in undergraduate and postgraduate institutes across the twin cities. For this study, the modified Delphi technique was conducted in three stages. Firstly, an extensive literature search was made to identify various components to design EPAs. In the second stage, face validation was done by a small sample of clinical teachers who were teaching surgery to undergraduates. Two iterative rounds of modified Delphi formed the third stage of the study. Achieving the consensus was set as the criteria for terminating the rounds at the end of the second round. Results: After a thorough literature search, a questionnaire was made which comprised of 7 EPAs, their subsequent 57competencies, different assessment strategies along with supervision levels. It was evaluated by a group of clinical teachers who teach surgery at the postgraduate and undergraduate levels. They graded each competency on a Likert scale.