Assessment Scale for Measuring Clinical Progress in Endodontic Postgraduate Program

Objectives: We present a performance assessment tool that can be used to conduct outcomes research and ongoing endodontic trainees clinical pattern of progress(ion) and program evaluation.
Methods: Data for a 2-year endodontic program was collected over a 9 year period from 2006-2014. Relevant clinical information was recorded by the treating residents in a structured data input form and saved in an Excel database. It was expected that trainees will complete a total of 245 non-surgical cases and 25 surgeries (270 cases total).The 9 years of data were subjected to bivariate and multivariate analyses to 1) determine patterns in trainee performance and 2) to create tools that would evaluate progress over time. Mixed effects models were used to compare the mean cumulative number of completed cases over time across 9 classes and to compute the corresponding line of best fit and its 95% prediction bounds (normative curve) that could be used as a tool to identify the range of acceptable performance in future trainees.
Results: The observed mean for this program was 324 completed cases which exceeded the minimum expectation. The peak performance in the mean cumulative number of completed cases per resident was attained after about 3 years of performance monitoring in 2009 and in 2014 (p<0.001 relative to the baseline in 2006). We calculated the line of best fit for the cumulative number of completed cases and its 95% prediction bounds for 9 years of data. This “prediction curve” can be used as a tool to identify trainees who might be slow in clinical advancement (Tardy/Turtles) and those that may exceed expected performance (Sprinters/Rabbits) by comparing the performance of the individual trainees against this curve.

Conclusions: We developed a useful tool, a “predictor scale” that can be used by endodontic educators to monitor clinical progress of the trainees.