MSS005: SURGERY RESIDENCY FEEDBACK: UTILIZATION OF NEW FEEDBACK APP TO IMPROVE FEEDBACK QUANTITY AND QUALITY
Binyam Hundito, MD; Benjamin L Scott, MD; Christopher Dyke, MD; Woo Do, MD; Robert Krell, MD; USU Walter Reed National Military Medical Center
Objectives: General surgery graduate medical education requires frequent feedback to help residents achieve mastery in multiple phases of patient care. The annual ACGME survey has cited nationwide deficits in resident perception of feedback. The American Board of Surgery now requires the use of a new application, SIMPL, to provide real-time feedback of residents’ performance to improve overall quantity, quality, and timing of feedback. Given the previous deficits in perceived feedback, we evaluate the new SIMPL application in comparison to the previous feedback system, MedHub, with respect to quantity and quality of feedback provided.
Methods: A retrospective review of deidentified, pooled feedback comments from both MedHub and SIMPL was compiled after the 2024-2025 academic year for General surgery residents. The feedback was then graded using the Quality Assessment of Learning Score (Qual), assessing quality of feedback based on the criteria domains of evidence, suggestion, and connection. Each feedback point was given a score for these domains and a total score. Number of feedback data points were reported for each evaluation system. Independent sample T tests were performed to compare mean scores of evidence, suggestion, connection and total scores of all assessments.
Results: 501 total feedback comments were recorded. 208 were recorded in MedHub (71 for PGY1, 31 for PGY2, 16 for PGY3, 43 for PGY4, and 47 for PGY5), and 293 in SIMPL (15 for PGY1, 58 for PGY2, 88 for PGY3, 42 for PGY4, and 90 for PGY5). Mean scores for evidence were significantly higher for MedHub (2.44 vs 2.23; p= 0.006) while mean scores for suggestion and connection were significantly higher for SIMPL (0.31 vs 0.46, p= 0.0003; and 0.30 vs 0.45, p = 0.0006). There was no difference in means of total scores (3.05 vs. 3.15, p=0.43). When broken down by year level of training, PGY2 mean evidence scores were significantly higher in MedHub (2.65 vs 2.01, p= 0.0005) and PGY4 score for suggestion were higher in SIMPL (0.21 vs. 0.48, p = 0.009) and connection (0.21 vs. 0.48, p = 0.009).
Conclusions: Use of the SIMPL app generated 85 more points of feedback and had significantly higher scores in the domains of suggestion and connection when compared to MedHub. Although no difference was found in total mean scores between the two systems, the SIMPL app has shown promise as an effective quality feedback tool for general surgery residents during the initial year of utilization.