What orthopaedic surgery residents need to know about the hand and wrist?

A 281-item questionnaire was developed and consisted of three sections: 1) Validated Musculoskeletal Core Curriculum; 2) Royal College of Physician and Surgeons of Canada (RCPSC) Specialty Objectives and; 3) A procedure list. A random group of 131 [out of 156] orthopaedic surgeons completed the questionnaire. Data were analyzed descriptively and quantitatively using histograms, a Modified Hotel ling's T2-statistic [1] with p-value determined by a permutation test, and the Benjamini-Hochberg/Yekutieli procedure131/156 (84%) orthopaedic surgeons participated in this study. 27/32 items received an average mean score of at least 3.0/4.0 by all respondents thus suggesting that 84% of the items are either "probably important" or "important" to know by the end of residency (SD range 0.007–0.228). The Benjamini-Hochberg procedure demonstrated that for 80% of the 32 × 31/2 = 496 possible pairs of hand and wrist questions did not appear to demonstrate the same distribution of ratings given that one question was different from that of another question.This study demonstrates with reliable statistical evidence, agreement on the importance of 27/32 items pertaining to hand and wrist reconstruction is included in a Core Curriculum for Orthopaedic Surgery. Residency training programs need ensure that educational opportunities focusing on the ability to perform with proficiency procedures pertaining to the hand and wrist is taught and evaluated in their respective programs.This paper is one section of a larger study regarding the development and validation of a core curriculum for orthopaedic surgery. One entire core curriculum was validated and ten individual analyses were completed so as to clarify the content that residents should learn during residency in orthopaedic surgery. The context of this paper pertains specifically to core curriculum items relating to hand and wrist reconstruction.The design and development of a curriculum targeted to meet the needs of a learner is esse