Source: Mentoring & Tutoring: Partnership in Learning, Volume 18, Issue 4, 2010, p. 337-359.
This qualitative study explores perspectives of 29 physician mentors on mentoring medical students in a well‐respected medical school’s formal, assigned, longitudinal mentoring program that has a curricular component in the second year.
Using a phenomenologic inductive approach, common themes identified centered on mentors’ relationships with their students and the characteristics of the relationships.
Mentors saw their roles change, yet relationships continued to develop as mentees advanced through medical school. The mentors were surprised when students sought contact, support, and advice in years three and four of their programs.
Mentors worried whether they “did enough” for their students, yet described their experiences and relationships as rewarding. Mentors subsequently found satisfaction in the continuing relationship during the clinical training years.
The researchers indicate the importance of the curricular component for providing a purpose and structure for relationship development and in facilitating relationship development in this assigned mentoring program.
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