Exploiting learning moments: varying forms of educational supervision in basic surgical education

Educational supervision by hospital consultants continues to be a central support for the learning in practice of junior doctors. Among medical educators, the consensus view is that the quality of clinically based teaching will be uplifted by the introduction of learner‐centred, facilitative methods. However, a qualitative evaluation of the surgical education of senior house officers (SHOs) has produced evidence that surgeon educators (SEs) worked with varying teaching perspectives as they adapted their supervisory practice to particular service conditions. The teaching of surgical trainees was a pragmatic art, involving shifting judgements in which SEs integrated knowledge content and pedagogic skills with the trainee's needs in a given context. This ability to move flexibly, and sometimes rapidly, around a wide repertoire of teaching expertise will be essential if SEs are to assist junior doctors in making sense of surgical experiences in increasingly restrictive and unpredictable service conditions.