Assessment of communication skills
Section snippets
Background
Communication skills are a firm part of training programs of most health professionals. Communication skills has been included as a main competency in all major competency frameworks used in medical education, like Can-Meds [1], ACGM outcomes project [2] and Good Medical Practice [3]. When training programs teach communication skills, then there is often a need to assess these skills as well. Have certain communication outcomes and skills been reached? Has the training program been effective?
Learning communication skills from an educational perspective
Modern training programs are outcome-based. Outcomes are usually defined in a set of competencies. A competency is the integration of knowledge, skills and attitudes to be able to perform a complex professional challenge [5]. Competency frameworks have been developed in all parts of the world with a purpose to better prepare graduates for the health care of the future [3,6,7]. Training programs are structured to cater these competencies in both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In all
Assessing communication
The term “constructive alignment” refers to the alignment of the assessment approach to the educational approach [29]. In case of a misalignment, the assessment approach will prevail and learning might actually be hampered. The insights on how we learn a complex skill such as communication is sketched above, the assessment would be constructively aligned when the assessment would be:
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longitudinally oriented
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as authentic as possible
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provide meaningful feedback
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be able to make valid (pass/fail or
Discussion and conclusion
The assessment literature has long been dominated with a psychometric approach [40]. Due to the move towards competency-based education, complex skills needed to be learned and assessed. Communication is one of them. Assessment has moved from this exclusive psychometric orientation to a more learning-oriented assessment. Instead of assessment driving learning, now learning is driving assessment. As is clear from the above, we recommend an assessment approach to communication where assessment
Funding
This paper did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
Declaration of Competing Interest
None.
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