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Short report
Confidence in palliative care issues by medical students and internal medicine residents
  1. Ana Carolina Montouro Storarri1,
  2. Giovana Dalmedico de Castro1,
  3. Lilian Castiglioni2 and
  4. Patricia Maluf Cury3
  1. 1 Coordination Department, Faculdade de Medicina de Sao Jose do Rio Preto, Brazil, South America
  2. 2 Department of Bioestatistic, Faculdade de Medicina de São José do Rio Preto, Brazil, South America
  3. 3 FACERES Medical School, Faculdade de medicina de São José do Rio Preto, Brazil, South America
  1. Correspondence to Dr Patricia Maluf Cury, FACERES Medical School, Faculdade de medicina de São José do Rio Preto, Brazil 15090-000, South America; pmcury{at}hotmail.com

Abstract

Background Palliative care (PC) is a relatively new field in Brazil, but this knowledge is of great importance in medical practice.

Objective To evaluate the degree of confidence among medical students and first-year and second-year internal medicine residents in addressing issues of death and terminal illness with patients and their families.

Method A modified version of the Self-Efficacy in Palliative Care Scale was applied to 293 students in their first year to sixth year at the School of Medicine of São José do Rio Preto and to 43 residents in their first year or second year of medical practice at the same institution in Brazil, in 2015. The questionnaire evaluated students' opinions on the need to include theoretical and practical classes on PC in the medical school.

Results Students in their fifth year of medical school were more confident than the students in their first, second, third and fourth years; there were no statistically significant differences between fifth-year students, sixth-year students and the internal medicine residents.

Conclusion Residents were more confident than all of the medical school students except those in their fifth year (P<0.05) because they have more contact with terminally ill patients than other students do; fifth-year medical students are likely overestimating their abilities.

  • end of life care
  • education and training
  • clinical decisions
  • communication

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjspcare-2017-001341

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors Conception and design of study: ACMS, GDdC, PMC. Acquisition of data ACMS, GDdC, PMC. Analysis and/or interpretation of data ACMS, GDdC, LC, PMC. Drafting the manuscript ACMS, PMC. Revising the manuscript critically for important intellectual content ACMS, PMC. Approval of the version of the manuscript to be published ACMS, GDdC, LC, PMC.

    • Funding Fundaçãode Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) (PROCESSO 2013/24533-8).

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Ethics approval Faculdade de Medicina de São José do Rio Preto, Brazil, Institutional Research Ethics Committee, reference numbers 27457314.9.0000.5415 and 27343614.2.0000.5415.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Presented at Poster presentation at the 22th International Congress of Palliative Montreal, Canada, October 2016.