Keynote Message

Multisource Feedback (MSF) or 360-degree feedback has become endemic across the continuum of medical education. Collecting feedback using a standardised questionnaire from colleagues, and in medicine sometimes from patients, is often advocated as a valid way to assess skills such as communication and professionalism. This talk will discuss in some detail what MSF is, where it has come from, what evidence there is (mapped to a newly introduced validity framework) for its use and what the limitations might be. Lastly, there will be an opportunity to discuss how this instrument might be useful in veterinary medicine and, if so, what might be the opportunities and barriers.

Key References

1.  Archer JC, Norcini J, Davies HA. Use of SPRAT for peer review of paediatricians in training. BMJ. 2005;330(7502):1251–3. DOI: 10.1136/bmj.38447.610451.8F.

2.  Miller A, Archer J. Impact of workplace based assessment on doctors' education and performance: a systematic review. BMJ. 2010;341:c5064. DOI: 10.1136/bmj.c5064.

3.  Sasaki H, Archer J, Yonemoto N, Mori R, Nishida T, Kusuda S, et al. Assessing doctors' competencies using multisource feedback: validating a Japanese version of the Sheffield Peer Review Assessment Tool (SPRAT). BMJ Open. 2015;5:e007135. DOI: e007135 doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2014-007135.

4.  Downing SM. Validity: on the meaningful interpretation of assessment data. Med Educ. 2003;37(9):830–837. DOI: 10.1046/j.1365-2923.2003.01594.x.