Evaluation
The MGH/McLean Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Residency Training Program defines ongoing evaluation of both residents and faculty performance as a mutual obligation in the training process. In addition, both residents and faculty must, at regular intervals, evaluate the Training Program as a whole as to whether it provides the means to meet the overall goals and objectives of residency training. Residents are evaluated in each of their clinical training services midway through the rotation and at its conclusion. In didactic seminars, residents are evaluated at the conclusion of each course. In turn, each faculty member and clinical service is evaluated, anonymously, by each resident halfway through a rotation and at the conclusion of a seminar. All evaluations must be supplemented by direct feedback between resident and faculty member during the process of working together.

Evaluations of performance in clinical services and didactic seminars are based on meeting two standards: satisfying the specific goals and objectives of a clinical service or didactic seminar and satisfying the goals and objectives of six core clinical competencies: patient care, medical knowledge, interpersonal and communication skills, practice-based learning and improvement, professionalism and systems-based practice. All goals and objectives are delineated in terms of knowledge, skills and attitudes. The resident must demonstrate increasing competency in each core area as it pertains to particular clinical techniques or modalities and in different settings.

It should be noted that “competency” is a relative term and should be assessed at the developmental level for a particular trainee. For example, one would expect the “competency” of a resident in the management of a case at the end of the first year to be different from that of a Boardcertified child and adolescent psychiatrist five years out in practice. As physicians, we must see practice in the context of “lifelong learning” and our evaluations should reflect the minimal standards of competent care for the developmental level of the individual being evaluated.