Clinician peer exchange groups (C-PEGs): Augmenting medical students’ learning on clinical placement

Abstract

This chapter describes our experience with a novel peer learning activity, Clinician Peer Exchange Groups (C-PEGs). C-PEGs were introduced as a forum for final year medical students on clinical placement to come together and share learning with their peers. C-PEGs took the form of multiple, peer-only, face-to-face groups of five students with relatively open-ended topics for discussion. These design elements helped to create a safe learning environment for students to share content that mattered to them. The scheduling of C-PEGs sessions throughout a clinical placement meant that students were able to discuss experiences while they were still fresh and this helped to engage the students with the process of reflection in an authentic and natural way. Both the design and evaluation of the C-PEGs activity will be presented in the body of this chapter. The evaluation results demonstrate that C-PEGs have value for learning, peer connection and peer support. The potential value of C-PEGs for final year medical students is heightened when considered as a scaffold for the lifelong learning skills of the reflective practitioner. Learning through the experiences and challenges of day-to-day practice, as opposed to studying for an exam, is more characteristic of learning post-graduation. This peer-based discussion should be introduced prior to graduation so that students (and, in turn, graduates) are primed to optimize their learning from experience. C-PEGs provide a mechanism to achieve this reflection on action. Finally, implications for practice are discussed along with directions for further research to examine the development of health professional students' reflective skills, and their capacity to openly consider and learn from mistakes and medical errors.