(204) Cultivating Confidence: Using Entrustable Professional Activities as a Blueprint for Continuing Professional Development

Objective : To evaluate the use of an EPA-based Continuing Professional Development (CPD) approach by analyzing students’ confidence levels and self-perceived areas of improvement from their CPD plans.

Methods: 87 second-year students completed CPD plans at the end of Fall and Spring quarters, where they rated their confidence in skill milestones for six EPA-based domains [Patient Care Provider (PCP), Collaborative Team Member (CTM), Evidence Based Practitioner (EBP), Developer, Communication, Accountability] from ‘none’ (0) to ‘all the time’ (4), and self-identified the domains in which they saw the most improvement and needed the most growth. Ratings were analyzed across domains for Pre-Fall, Post-Fall, and Post-Spring quarters and a Wilcoxon signed rank test was used for comparison. A qualitative assessment of themes was performed on student responses regarding areas for continued growth.

Results: Across all three timepoints, students were most confident in their Accountability skills and least confident in their EBP skills. Despite this, they experienced the largest shift in confidence in the EBP domain, with a median rating of ‘some of the time’ (1) increasing to ‘most of the time’ (3) by the end of Spring quarter (p <.001). Students’ self-identified areas for continued growth were spread across all six domains, with the most students selecting EBP (29.9%), followed by PCP (24.1%) at the end of Spring quarter. Reported EBP areas for growth included efficiently reading and analyzing studies and identifying study limitations.

Conclusions: An EPA-based CPD plan allowed for reflection and development of individualized plans, as students selected a wide array of EPA areas on which to focus their continuous professional development. This approach can help schools explore areas of strength and growth at an individual student and curricular level.