Background: Medical schools struggle to provide timely, high-quality
clinical feedback and the means to ensure faculty engagement in
competency-based evaluation. Existing systems often lack actionable insights,
limiting learner development and program quality monitoring. The objective of
this project was to identify stakeholder needs and validate assumptions for a
digital dashboard offering real-time, longitudinal feedback on student
competency progression.
Methods: Through the National Science Foundation Propelus I-Corps program,
20 structured interviews with medical students, faculty, education deans,
across multiple institutions over a four-week period were conducted.
Open-ended interview questions focused on the end user’s responsibilities,
pain points, current solutions and barriers to implementing/using a
competency dashboard. Interviews explored challenges in the feedback
processes, perceived value of longitudinal tracking, and feasibility of
technology adoption.
Results: Thematic analysis of the interviews revealed valuable insights.
Students reported current evaluations lack value due to poor specificity and
absence of longitudinal visibility. Faculty cited lack of incentives and
training as barriers to meaningful feedback. Education deans expressed
interest in centralized platforms for longitudinal data but raised concerns
about feedback quality and questioned their capabilities to adopt Entrustable
Professional Activity based tools. These findings reinforced the need for
integrated solutions that improve feedback quality rather than simply
digitize existing processes.
Conclusion: Stakeholders desire a unified platform that enhances feedback
quality, supports faculty development, and enables institutions to monitor
competency progression for accreditation and continuous improvement.
Interview results have allowed us to refine the dashboard which will be
demonstrated as part of this presentation. Next steps include piloting the
tool at two medical schools while pursuing funding and partnerships for
broader implementation.