Objective: To survey prevocational doctors working in Australian hospitals on aspects of postgraduate learning.
Participants and setting: 470 prevocational doctors in 36 health services in Australia, August 2003 to October 2004.
Design: Cross-sectional cohort survey with a mix of ordinal multicategory questions and free text.
Main outcome measures: Perceived preparedness for aspects of clinical practice; perceptions of the quantity and usefulness of current teaching and learning methods and desired future exposure to learning methods.
Results: 64% (299/467) of responding doctors felt generally prepared for their job, 91% (425/469) felt prepared for dealing with patients, and 70% (325/467) for dealing with relatives. A minority felt prepared for medicolegal problems (23%, 106/468), clinical emergencies (31%, 146/469), choosing a career (40%, 188/468), or performing procedures (45%, 213/469). Adequate contact with registrars was reported by 90% (418/465) and adequate contact with consultants by 56% (257/466); 20% (94/467) reported exposure to clinical skills training and 11% (38/356) to high-fidelity simulation. Informal registrar contact was described as useful or very useful by 94% (433/463), and high-fidelity simulation by 83% (179/216). Most prevocational doctors would prefer more formal instruction from their registrars (84%, 383/456) and consultants (81%, 362/447); 84% (265/316) want increased exposure to high-fidelity simulation and 81% (283/350) to professional college tutorials.
Conclusion: Our findings should assist planning and development of training programs for prevocational doctors in Australian hospitals.