Attitudes toward obstetrics training. Residents surveyed at McGill University and University of Montreal

Abstract

Objective: To determine family medicine residents' attitudes toward family practice training in obstetrics and neonatology before and after implementation of a modified obstetrics curriculum at McGill University (MG).

Design: Two-group pretest and posttest. Fifty-seven respondents, 31 at MG, 26 at University of Montreal (UM), were case matched as first-year and second-year residents.

Setting: Departments of Family Medicine at MG and UM.

Participants: Family medicine residents at MG and UM.

Intervention: A modified obstetrics curriculum was introduced at MG (study group); no modifications were introduced at UM (control group). First- and second-year residents' attitudes toward the adequacy of training were assessed through responses to a questionnaire administered in July 1992 and July 1994.

Main outcome measures: Changes in response scores before and after implementation of the modified curriculum.

Results: Repeated multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) showed respondents believed family practice obstetrics training was adequate in general, but that family practitioners were inadequately trained in emergency obstetric skills. Scores for items assessing neonatology skills increased significantly in the MG group after the intervention.

Conclusions: Residents' overall confidence in their obstetrics training did not appear to improve, but this might be due to a time lag between curriculum modification and attitudinal change. McGill residents' confidence in neonatology skills improved significantly after curriculum modification.