State of the science in health professional education: effective feedback

To achieve truly effective feedback, the health professions must nurture recipient reflection-in-action. This builds on self-monitoring informed by external feedback. An integrated approach must be developed to support a feedback culture. Early training and experience such as peer feedback may over time support the required cultural change. Opportunities to provide feedback must not be missed, including those to impart potentially powerful feedback from high-stakes assessments. Feedback must be conceptualised as a supported sequential process rather than a series of unrelated events. Only this sustained approach will maximise any effect.