Introduction: Near-peer teaching offers mutual benefits for clinical trainees and the students they teach. However, General Practice Speciality Trainees (GPSTs) are typically less involved in community-based teaching than their hospital-based peers and often do so without formal pedagogical training. This study details the immediate and longer-term evaluation of a teaching skills course delivered to final year GPSTs. It addresses a gap within existing near-peer literature which, although extensive, is predominantly hospital-based and limited to short-term outcomes.
Methods: The course was designed and delivered to all local final year GPST schemes. Pre- and post-course questionnaires scoring confidence, comfort, and understanding of teaching roles were analysed across two years' delivery. Furthermore, individual interviews of participants 4-6 months after attendance were thematically analysed to explore how GPSTs translated course content into practice.
Results: GPSTs reported a decline in their teaching activities as they embarked on their final year of GP teaching. Immediate post-course teaching-related confidence and knowledge scores increased. However, follow-up interviews revealed that GPSTs' initial enthusiasm was short-lived and outweighed by competing demands within an intensive short-duration training scheme. They expressed concerns about their own learner status as they themselves developed competency in a vast and varied speciality, and cited a lack of support from their trainers.
Conclusions: Teaching skill courses alone are insufficient to address the ongoing challenges of enhancing the teaching role of GPSTs. Further work is now needed to explore multi-level interventions to promote the role of GPSTs as near-peer teachers to harness the mutual benefits to all involved.
Keywords: GP trainees; near-peer teaching; teaching skills.