The Assistant Doctors 'Experience and Vocational Training Satisfaction in Ophthalmology in Bavaria: Outcomes of an Online Survey with Evaluation of the Vocational Training in Ophthalmic Surgery

Background The following paper presents findings of an online survey on the assistant doctors 'vocational training experiences and satisfaction in Bavaria with a special focus on the evaluation of their ophthalmic surgery training. The starting point for the survey were recent studies and experience reports on the situation of assistant doctors in ophthalmology, which have rudimentarily unveiled the assistant doctors' dissatisfaction with their ophthalmic surgery training as well as the neglect of support for acquiring ophthalmic surgery competences. Method In March 2017, 219 assistant doctors in Bavaria were e-mailed and asked to evaluate the quality of their experienced ophthalmic surgery training by completing an online questionnaire with a total of 38 open and closed questions. Results The findings of the survey have shown that 69% of the assistant doctors are dissatisfied with their ophthalmic surgery training. Over 50% of the cases criticize the trainer doctor's loss of motivation to train their assistants in ophthalmic surgery. The following results create a fundamental tension to the assistant doctors' request for a substantiated training in that field, which over 90% of the respondents have articulated. Based on a defined catalogue of ophthalmic surgery interventions in the professional training guidelines for ophthalmologists in Bavaria, considerable deficits in the area of eyelid, tear duct and rectus eye muscle surgery could have been identified. Conclusion Considering the limited scope and response rate, the survey presented in this paper must be defined as a pilot study. Nevertheless, the results plea for a nation-wide survey to be able to representatively formulate demand-orientated approaches for improvement concerning the ophthalmic surgery training in Germany. However, it is clear that in comparison to conservative approaches in ophthalmology, the ophthalmic surgery training has been neglected to a certain point, although the professional training guidelines for ophthalmologists in Bavaria include a series of surgical interventions to be handled by assistant doctors.