Qualitative study: Perceptions of surgical competence among Chinese professional surgical postgraduate students in clinical medicine

Abstract

Abstract Purpose The purpose of this study is to explore the perceptions of surgical competence among Chinese professional surgical postgraduate students in clinical medicine with the aim of improving the surgical competence of postgraduate students and exploring the recommendations of postgraduate students regarding the current program for the development of surgical competence. Background China has officially mandated the integration of master's degree education into clinical medicine and standardized residency training since 2015. Since that time, the training of Chinese postgraduate students in clinical medicine has improved significantly, and the number of postgraduate students in clinical medicine in China has been increasing in recent years. Due to the use of various new technologies in the field of surgery, the perceptions of some surgeons regarding surgical competence have changed. Methodology: This study was conducted using qualitative methods. Data were collected from voice recordings of one-on-one, in-depth interviews, which were conducted using semistructured questions. Qualitative content analysis was used to evaluate the audio recordings. Results The major themes and subthemes of the study were as follows: (1)surgical competence is considered to be very important by clinical medicine professional surgical postgraduate students (surgical ability is considered to be useful for improving clinical operation by clinical medicine professional surgical postgraduate students and that surgical ability is considered to be useful for developing the clinical thinking of clinical medicine professional surgical postgraduate students) and (2) the ways in which surgical ability can be improved according to clinical medicine professional surgical postgraduate students (clinical medicine professional surgical postgraduate students believe that more effort is needed to develop surgical skills and that clinical medicine professional surgical postgraduate students believe that they need more help from the hospital/department in terms of improving their surgical skills). Conclusions Chinese professional surgical postgraduate students in clinical medicine consider surgical competence to be very important because they believe that it enhances clinical operations and clinical thinking, which are necessary for them to become great surgeons. They are interested in ways of improving their surgical competence, and this study found that they believe that investing more time and effort in the development of their surgical competence is likely to lead to improved surgical competence and that the help provided by the department/hospital could also lead to improvements in their surgical competence.