Meet one of our Research Grant submissions: 'How do clinical supervisors from regional, rural and remote areas integrate new supervisory strategies after training?'
High-quality clinical supervision in health workplaces is essential for the safety of learners and patients. Clinical supervision is particularly important in rural and remote areas which may be resource-deprived, have unique cultural requirements and a transient health workforce. Health professionals have rated professional development in clinical supervision as beneficial in terms of enhanced values, knowledge and skills, usually immediately after attendance. Little is known about how clinical supervisors apply their learnings to their supervisory practice following clinical supervision training, and how new behaviours are formed. This project seeks to explore the question: How do clinical supervisors from regional, rural and remote areas integrate learning from clinical supervision training into their supervisory practice?
This qualitative exploratory study has commenced in the Northern Territory (NT). The research is now well underway, with interviews being conducted with clinical supervisors across many regions of the NT. Interviews have been conducted with health professionals from several disciplines who also provide clinical supervision to learners in the workplace. In the context of this study, the term “learners” refers to students, interns, new graduates, junior health professionals, or senior health professionals learning a new area of health practice. Health professionals can include doctors, nurses, midwives, dentists, Aboriginal Health Practitioners, and allied health professionals. Clinical supervisors’ workplaces include health, education, disability, and community services settings which may be part of the public, private or not-for-profit sector within the Northern Territory. Participant recruitment occurred approximately three months after clinical supervisors attended one of the clinical supervision workshops delivered by Flinders Rural and Remote Health NT academics. The clinical supervision training has been tailored to the NT context, incorporating working in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and remote health contexts.
This project commenced as part of one of the investigators’ Master of Clinical Education research project. Although this qualification has now been obtained, the research team wish to progress this existing project to include data involving participants from the more remote sites of the NT. The research team applied for an ANZAHPE research grant to assist with the associated costs.
The research team plans to develop reports to be shared with relevant stakeholders, to publish results in an academic journal, and share results at an ANZAHPE conference. It is anticipated that the clinical education community and other stakeholders would benefit from knowledge of the implications to practice and incorporation of relevant improvements into existing clinical supervision workshops to bridge the training-practice gap.
For more information, contact: Mel Ridd via melba.ridd@flinders.edu.au