ITERs are completed online using the POstgraduate Web Evaluation and Registration (POWER) system.  The ITER generally consists of a number of questions with rating scales and qualitative comments, as well as a global question that rates overall performance.

The educational goals and objectives of a clinical fellowship may include significant research/scholarly activity. Postgraduate medical departments/divisions/units currently use a variety of evaluation questions in POWER-based ITERs to assess this research/scholarly activity.

Research Rotations Completed by Clinical Fellows is a collection of sample questions that have appeared in ITERs completed through the POWER system during 2016-17. The variety of evaluation questions for each CanMEDS role may reflect the diversity of educational goals and objectives from one clinical fellowship to another. The duration of the research rotations for which ITERs were completed using the POWER system in 2016-17 was also variable.

Some sample evaluation questions have been edited to remove details that might identify an individual fellowship program.

Research Rotations Completed by Residents Enrolled in the Clinician Investigator Program (CIP) is an excerpt from the template ITER in use by the Clinician Investigator Program for residency trainees engaged in research/scholarly activity. This excerpt illustrates evaluation questions that could be relevant to the use of POWER-based ITERs to record the evaluation of research/scholarly activity by clinical fellows.

RESEARCH ROTATIONS COMPLETED BY CLINICAL FELLOWS

IN-TRAINING EVALUATION REPORT | SAMPLE EVALUATION QUESTIONS

A.    MEDICAL EXPERT

• Interest and Motivation
• Originality
• Judgement and critical thinking

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• Intellectual Ability
• Industry and Perseverance
• Technical skills related to research
• Use and care of equipment
• Self-assessment ability (insight)
• Independence
• Demonstrates knowledge and understanding of basic science, clinical, epidemiological and biostatistics principles as relevant to research project
• Shows progressive expertise in the particular area of knowledge related to main research topic
• Demonstrates ability to formulate hypothesis and select and supply appropriate methods to undertake an experimental or hypothesis-driven research plan
•  Demonstrates knowledge of the relevant medical information inherent to the research question
• Demonstrates results into daily practice

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B.    COMMUNICATOR

• Quality of oral presentations
• Quality of written reports
• Team relationship

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• Communication with public and media
• Interactions with lab/research colleagues
• Establishes therapeutic relationships with patients/families
• Delivers understandable information to patients/families
• Provides effective counseling to patients/families
•  Maintains professional relationships with other health care providers
•  Provides clear and complete records & reports (including oral reports)
•  Maintains organized, detailed records of the progress of the research project in the form of a research log or a laboratory notebook
•  Communicates clearly and effectively, bother verbally and in writing with other physicians, researchers and other health care professionals
•    Accurately synthesizes relevant information and perspectives on the topic of research
•  Effectively addresses challenging communication issues such as developing informed consent forms and obtaining consent
•  Conveys effective oral and written formulation of project progress and final reports on the research including local presentations, presentations at national and international meetings and submission of findings to a peer-reviewed publication
•  Understanding and practice of informed consent
•  information regarding risks and benefits of participating in research
•  Produces a well-organized, clear and effective scientific manuscript

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C.    COLLABORATOR

• Collaboration with other research teams
• Demonstrates ability to accept, consider and respect opinions of other members of the team
• Works effectively in a team environment

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• Consults effectively with other physicians and health care providers
• Participates effectively and appropriately in an inter-professional research environment (including planning meetings, research projects, laboratory and/or office environment)
• Respects team ethics including confidentiality, resource allocation and professionalism
• Ability to function as a member of a multi-disciplinary health care team
• Attends and contributes appropriately to research team meetings
• Takes a leadership role in creating a safe environment for sharing information and expertise
• Participates effectively and appropriately in intraprofessional and interprofessional research teams
• Demonstrates an ability to prevent misunderstandings, manage differences and resolve conflicts

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D.    MANAGER

• Organizational ability
• Supervisory skills
• Contribution to overall functioning of research program

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• Manages time effectively
• Allocates health care resources effectively
• Utilizes information technology effectively
• Works effectively in a health care organization
• Demonstrates initiative in project development and implementation
• Identifies sources of funding available including local, provincial, and national
• Sets priorities and manages time to balance patient care, research activities and personal life
• Prepares and manages a research budget including finances and human resources
• Implements processes to ensure personal practice improvement
• Employs information technology appropriately for research
• Observes administrative or leadership roles as appropriate, developing an understanding of what it entails to become a principal investigator and achieve progressive independence
• Understands effective resource utilization in [name of discipline]
• Understands the fundamentals of quality assurance in [name of discipline]
• Understands safety issues and economic considerations in [name of discipline]
• Demonstrates time management skills to reflect and balance priorities for research, clinical care, and personal life
• Meets appropriate deadlines (funding, submission, REB, draft manuscripts to reviewers)
• Manages time to complete assigned duties (REB application, data collection, data analysis, manuscript preparation, etc.)

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E.    HEALTH ADVOCATE

• Advocacy relating to importance of health research
• Is attentive to preventative measures
• Is attentive to issues of public policy for health

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• Recognizes the important determinants of health
• Demonstrates concern that patients have access to appropriate information and services
• Advocates on behalf of patients
• Involves the patient and/or family in medical decision-making
• Identifies the health needs of a particular group of patients and develops a research project that will address a question relevant to that group
• Identifies opportunities for advocacy, health promotion and disease prevention during interaction with other researchers, and responds appropriately
• Appreciates the possibility of competing interests between the research community and the patient population or among different patient populations
• Describes how public policy impacts on the direction of research and health determinants of the population studied
• Understands benefits and risks in investigations
• Understands role of population screening
• Recognition of situations in which treatment would be detrimental to the health/safety of a patient

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F.    SCHOLAR

• Knowledge of research topic
• Critical evaluation of scientific papers
• Statistics and measurement skills

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• Attends and contributes to rounds, seminars and other learning events
• Contributes to the development of new knowledge
• Demonstrates knowledge and compliance with the principles of ethics with respect to research, clinical research and teaching settings
• Prepares a Research Ethics Board (REB) proposal where appropriate
• Participates in the review of papers submitted to a journal for publication
• Demonstrates knowledge of the principles and strategies for implementing a system to maintain and enhance professional activities through ongoing learning
• Integrates new learning into ongoing research and report/paper writing
• Is able to describe principles of good research, and use them to be able to judge whether a research project is properly designed
• Demonstrates teaching ability as it applies to families, students, trainees, other health professionals, and, where appropriate, the public
• Development of personal continuing education strategy
• Demonstrates an understanding of the scientific principles of research and scholarly inquiry and the role of research evidence in contemporary health care
• Poses questions amenable to scholarly investigation and selects appropriate methods to address them
• Discusses and critiques the methodology when addressing a given scholarly question
• Selects the appropriate data analysis for the scholarly question
• Demonstrates an understanding of the application of biostatistics, research ethics, study design, protocol writing and manuscript preparation
• Disseminates the findings of a study through presentations/manuscript preparation
• Demonstrates familiarity with research methodology and statistics

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G.    PROFESSIONAL

• Ethical standards (recognizes and addresses ethical issues)
• Integrity, honesty, responsibility and compassion
• Self-assessment ability (insight)

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• Ability to manage stress
• Maintains appropriate boundaries in work and learning situations
• Shows respect of diversity of race, age, gender, disability, intelligence, sexual orientation and socio-economic status
• Exhibits appropriate  professional behaviours in research including honesty, integrity, commitment, compassion, respect and altruism
• Demonstrates a commitment to conduct and participate in the highest quality research
• Demonstrates a commitment to the patients, profession, and society through the participation in profession-led regulation
• Balances personal and professional priorities to ensure personal health and a sustainable practice
• Completes REB ethics tutorial training
• Acceptance of constructive criticism
• Demonstrates an awareness of personal limitations and seeks guidance and/or feedback as appropriate

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H.    OVERALL COMPETENCE

• Overall competence

I.    COMMENTS

• General competence:
• Motivation:
• General comments:
• (Please write a statement as to general impression and development during the trainee’s rotation. Please emphasize STRENGTHS and WEAKNESSES.)

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• (Provide a general impression of the trainee’s development during this rotation, including general competence, motivation and consultant skills. Please emphasize strengths and areas that require improvement. If ‘exceeds expectations’, ‘needs improvement’, and/or ‘unsatisfactory’ ratings have been assigned, provide the supporting comments in this space. Please include the individuals who were part of this assessment.)
• Strengths:
• Weaknesses:
• Recommendations:
• Continue in training program?
• Have you had a face-to-face feedback session at the end of the rotation to review the Fellow’s performance? (Yes/no)

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RESEARCH ROTATIONS COMPLETED BY RESIDENTS ENROLLED IN
THE CLINICIAN INVESTIGATOR PROGRAM (CIP)

CLINICIAN INVESTIGATOR PROGRAM, UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO IN-TRAINING EVALUATION REPORT | EXCERPTED EVALUATION QUESTIONS

SCHOLAR

• General knowledge – establishes and maintains knowledge and understanding of general principles and fundamentals of research
• Specific knowledge – establishes and maintains knowledge and understanding of the specialized topics in the specific area of research
• Elicits, synthesizes, and critically evaluates information and applies it appropriately to research
• Technical skills – overall competence in techniques required for the research project (i.e. experimental design, data collection and management, and analysis)
• Analytical skills – overall competence in analyzing and interpreting the results of an experiment
• Consults appropriately for feedback on knowledge and performance

MEDICAL RESEARCH EXPERT

• Integrates CanMEDS roles to conduct ethical research
• Appropriately consults with others, recognizing limits of own expertise

COMMUNICATOR

• Develops rapport, trust and ethical relationships with research participants, peers, other professionals
• Quality of written research proposals, reports, grant proposals and manuscripts
• Effectively presents own work at lab meetings, research seminars, thesis advisory committee meetings, scientific meetings, and able to defend and discuss the presentation in an articulate and polished manner

COLLABORATOR

• Participates effectively and appropriately in interprofessional research teams
• Works effectively with others in research teams
• Endeavours to form collaborative relationships within the scientific community
• Demonstrates an ability to prevent, negotiate and resolve interprofessional conflicts

MANAGER

• Effectively manages activities for research and career development
• Effectively manages research resources (financial & materials), data recording and results
• Serves in administration and leadership roles, as appropriate

HEALTH ADVOCATE

• Demonstrates appreciation of social, economic and biologic factors that impact health research
• Demonstrates advocacy for subjects, patients, populations, communities, as appropriate
• Promotes research knowledge translation to patients, populations, communities, other stakeholders, as appropriate

PROFESSIONAL

• Demonstrates commitment to profession, society, research participants and patients through the importance of absolute objectivity and honesty in the conduct of research