How Patients Think: Assessing Clinician Competence in University Settings

The past academic year of 2014–2015 I completed an independent research study to observe how patients assess clinician competence within a university setting. The goal of the research was twofold: first, to look at patient-clinician interactions from the patient’s perspective, and second to see if a patient’s past experiences with clinicians have any effect on their current assessment of clinician competence. The study focused on college students at the University of New Hampshire (UNH), Durham campus. In the following paragraphs, I provide a summary of the research project, methodology, and outcomes