A survey of desired skills to acquire in ophthalmology training: a descriptive statistical analysis.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: To determine which skills are most important to clinicians and how they correlate with Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) competencies.

PATIENTS AND METHODS: A descriptive analysis to test four hypotheses: specific skill sets are likely to be important/mandatory for residents to obtain during training; comprehensive and subspecialist ophthalmologists would likely value skills similarly; year of training would likely affect the ranking of skills; and surveying practicing ophthalmologist could help to modify the educational curriculum.

RESULTS: Highest-ranked skill sets included interpersonal and communication skills (mean, 1.17 +/- 0.08), ocular trauma (mean, 1.28 +/- 0.26), and practice-based learning (mean, 1.37). Comprehensive ophthalmologists and subspecialists did not significantly differ in the ranking of skill sets. Year of graduation did not affect the ranking of skill sets.

CONCLUSION: The ACGME core competencies of interpersonal and communication skills and practice-based learning were ranked as highly important to both comprehensive and subspecialty ophthalmologists. These are included in ACGME core competency requirements. These findings support ACGME core competencies and the need for continued evaluation of ophthalmology residents in all areas of medical training.