Professionalism in clerkships: an analysis of MSPE commentary.
BACKGROUND
Professionalism in medical school predicts future behaviors. The authors assessed prevalence of references to professionalism behaviors in the clerkship commentary portion of Medical School Performance Evaluations (MSPEs).


METHODS
Content analyses of 293 MSPEs submitted for 2005 graduates.


RESULTS
Overall, 70% of MSPEs specifically mentioned professionalism; 96% included information about at least 1 of 16 professional behaviors. Internal Medicine referenced significantly more behaviors than other clerkships. Commentary about behaviors such as interactions (94%) and motivation (91%) was common; behaviors such as truthfulness (8%) and confidentiality (6%) were rarely mentioned. Fewer than 1% of comments could be considered negative.


CONCLUSIONS
Most professionalism comments in MSPEs are generic and somewhat bland, tending to be about students' collegial interactions and hard work. More detail and breadth may be facilitated by wider use of behavior-centered evaluation in clerkships.
Shea
Judy A
JA
University of Pennsylvania, 1223 Blockley Hall, 423 Guardian Drive, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6021, USA. sheaja@mail.med.upenn.edu
O'Grady
Elizabeth
E
Wagner
Barbara R
BR
Morris
Jon B
JB
Morrison
Gail
G
D002982:Clinical Clerkship; D003099:College Admission Test; D015709:Correspondence as Topic; D017408:Guidelines as Topic; D006801:Humans; D007396:Internship and Residency; D007400:Interprofessional Relations; D011361:Professional Competence; D011369:Professional-Patient Relations; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012919:Social Behavior; D014481:United States