Quality Assurance of Mammogram Training Courses via Questionnaire : Second Report

Mammography for breast cancer screening has become more widespread since the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare notified local governments of the 65th Notice of the Elderly Health Law. However, there is still a shortage of qualified doctors skilled in interpreting mammograms. Many short training courses on mammogram interpretation have been offered nationwide. We previously reported that a questionnaire provided easy assessment of the quality of mammography training courses, and that doctors who were more experienced with film interpretation obtained higher scores in post-course film reading tests. This report analyzes answers to the questionnaires distributed at the 3rd and 4th short training courses for instructors in June and July, 2000. Forty-eight doctors participated in the 3rd course, of whom 2% were experienced in reading films of less than 200 cases, 40% had such experience in 201-1, 000 cases, and 58% in 1, 001 cases or more. Forty-five doctors participated in the 4th course, for whom the corresponding figures were 12%, 24% and 64%, respectively. The percentages of doctors who obtained grades A (instructor level) and B (adequate level) in the post-course test were 25% and 56% (A + B = 81%) after the 3rd course, and 27% and 58% (A + B = 85%) after the 4th course, respectively. We recommend that mammography training courses should be stratified according to the film reading experience of the participants in order to tailor programs, determine difficulty, and assure quality.