An Educational Intervention to Reduce Anxiety Related to Video Precepting

Background and Objectives: Use of videotaped or video monitoring within residency training has been demonstrated to provide meaningful and relevant feedback material across the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) defined core competencies and reinforce assessment and treatment of patients from a bio psychosocial model [1-12]. While residency programs may vary on the format of using video monitoring/taping, the premise is to record the resident interactions with patients and provide feedback on medical interviewing skills, patient physician relationship, procedures, etc. However, results from research in the area demonstrate that some residents respond to video precepting with some degree of apprehension. The aim of this pilot study was to discover if an educational intervention delivered at the beginning of a Family Medicine residency would reduce resident apprehension about the video precepting process. Methods: 10 first year Family Medicine residents were given the Westside Test Anxiety Scale (WTAS) and a pretest survey, consisting of qualitative questions related to prior supervision experiences. They were then exposedto an educational program related to video precepting. Following six months of video precepting, posttest measures were given designed to capture levels of anxiety related to video precepting post intervention. Results: The findings indicate that the educational intervention did not significantly reduce anxiety related to precepting. However, the scores of anxiety did decrease over the pretest and posttest period. Conclusions: More research is needed to determine how to reduce anxiety in residents related to video monitoring and maximize the utility of this training tool.