Assessment of postgraduate educational environment in public and private hospitals of Karachi.

OBJECTIVE

To assess the environment of postgraduate fellowship training in teaching hospitals of an urban centre.

METHODS

The cross-sectional study was conducted at one public-sector and two private-sector teaching hospitals in Karachi from December 2014 to June 2015. Data was collected by using a modified version of Postgraduate Hospital Educational Environment Measure, a validated questionnaire, for which clinical residents were selected through convenience sampling. Data was analyzed using SPSS 16.

RESULTS

Of the 302 participants, 168(55.6%) were males and 134(44.4%) were females. The overall mean age of the respondents was 28.46±3.03 years. The internal reliability of the questionnaire was good with a Cronbach's alpha of 0.92. The overall mean score of 93.96±20.79suggested more positive than negative perception with room for improvement. After adjusting for all important socio-demographic and residency co-variates, residency in a private hospital was positively associated with Postgraduate Hospital Educational Environment Measure score (p<0.01) compared to residency in public hospitals.

CONCLUSIONS

There is an urging need to standardise postgraduate training in terms of teaching, autonomy and social support in public and private hospitals of Karachi.