evaluations

As I read evaluations given to me at the end of a clerkship, I wonder about what the utility of an evaluation is. It’s a chance for physicians and residents to comment on my personality, work ethic, interactions with patients, and clinical knowledge. Yet how much do these observers really see? What kind of snapshot does my limited time with them provide? How much weight should I put into assimilating what they write into an understanding of who I am as a future doctor?

I receive lots of positive comments and then the one or two token constructive comments: have more initiative, read more before coming into clinic each day, know the basics, keep working on your assessment and plan. What does this give me?

I am writing evaluations to three individuals I worked with who I think could do a much better job at being compassionate. Is it my place to critique their interactions with patients? Is it my place to critique their interaction with me as non-constructive, unhelpful? I suppose so. I feel strange evaluating their skills which rest on the foundation of their personalities and qualities/characteristics. Perhaps that is the crux of this situation: being a physician (and developing oneself into a “great” physician) is about how you are as much as what you know.