Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2022 Dec 1;22(1):832.
doi: 10.1186/s12909-022-03891-w.

Reflection on near-peer shadowing program: impact on operating room student's perception of their future profession

Mahboobeh Khabaz Mafinejad  1 , Fatemeh Ebrahimpour  2 , Azadeh Sayarifard  3 , Fatemeh Shahbazi  4   5 , Larry Gruppen  6
Affiliations

Reflection on near-peer shadowing program: impact on operating room student's perception of their future profession

Mahboobeh Khabaz Mafinejad et al. BMC Med Educ. .

Abstract

Background: Reflection is a key element in learning from observation and experience of future profession's roles and responsibilities in clinical encounters. Moreover, reflection helps students cope with the challenges, complexities, and uncertainties of professional development. Students' written reflections on clinical exposure offer valuable information, and their analysis provides instructors with invaluable insight into students' experiences. This study evaluated Operating Room students' written reflections on their first clinical exposure experiences towards their future profession through the shadowing program.

Methods: This study was a qualitative analysis on Operating Room freshmen's reflections in the undergraduate program of Zahedan and Zabol University of Medical Sciences in Iran. After the shadowing program, all participants were asked to write an unstructured written reflection, and these fifty written reflections were de-identified and independently analyzed‏ using the thematic analysis approach.

Results: Qualitative analysis extracted 10 subthemes and four main themes including (i) Moving towards the guiding realities of future profession, (ii) Discovering milestones of realizing professional identity, (iii) Managing the emotions affecting the perception of future profession's desirability, and (iv) Excellence in professional growth and development.

Conclusion: Reflecting on the experience of the shadowing program, the participants described being in the OR environment as a stimulating and valuable learning opportunity. Moreover, this experience helped improve their perception of future profession's realities, as well as initiate realization of professional identity and planning for professional developments.

Keywords: Operating Room Technicians; Perception; Qualitative Research; Reflection; Students.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

References

    1. Chandavarkar U, Azzam A, Mathews CA. Anxiety symptoms and perceived performance in medical students. Depress Anxiety. 2007;24(2):103–111. doi: 10.1002/da.20185. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Pitkala KH, Mantyranta T. Professional socialization revised: medical students' own conceptions related to adoption of the future physician's role–a qualitative study. Med Teach. 2003;25(2):155–160. doi: 10.1080/0142159031000092544. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Allaz A. Exploring the major difficulties perceived by residents in training: a pilot study. Swiss medical weekly. 2004;134(41-42):612–7. - PubMed
    1. Windish DM, Paulman PM, Goroll AH, Bass EB. Do clerkship directors think medical students are prepared for the clerkship years? Acad Med. 2004;79(1):56–61. doi: 10.1097/00001888-200401000-00013. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Baraz Pardenjani S, Rostami M, Loorizadeh M. State of clinical education at Tehran University of Medical Sciences from the viewpoint of students of nursing & midwifery. J Med Educ Develop. 2008;2(2):16–26.

LinkOut - more resources