Understanding resident learning preferences within an internal medicine noon conference lecture series: a qualitative study.

BACKGROUND: The lecture remains the most common approach for didactic offerings in residency programs despite conflicting evidence about the effectiveness of this format.
OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to explore the perspectives of internal medicine residents toward conferences held in the lecture format.
METHODS: The investigators invited internal medicine residents (N  =  144) to participate in focus groups discussing their perspectives about noon conference lectures. The investigators used a semistructured guide to ask about motivations for attendance and effectiveness of noon conferences, transcribed the recordings, coded the discussions, and analyzed the results.
RESULTS: Seven focus groups with a total of 41 residents were held. This identified 4 major domains: (1) motivations for attendance; (2) appropriate content; (3) effective teaching methods; and (4) perspectives on active participation. Residents' motivations were categorized into external factors, including desire for a break and balance to their workload, and intrinsic attributes, including the learning opportunity, topic, and speaker. Appropriate content was described as clinically relevant, practical, and presenting a balance of evidence. Identified effective teaching methods included shorter teaching sessions focused on high-yield learning points structured around cases and questions. While active participation increases residents' perceived level of stress, the benefits of this format include increased attention and learning.
CONCLUSIONS: This study furthers our knowledge of the learning preferences of internal medicine residents within the changing environment of residency education and can be used in conjunction with principles of adult learning to reform how we deliver core medical knowledge.