Chronic Pelvic Pain Educational Experience Among Minimally Invasive Gynecologic Surgery Fellows and Recent Graduates: A Needs Assessment

STUDY OBJECTIVE: Learning to evaluate and treat chronic pelvic pain (CPP) is an established curriculum objective within the Fellowship in Minimally Invasive Gynecologic Surgery (FMIGS). Our aim was to investigate current educational experiences related to the evaluation and management of CPP and the impacts of those experiences on FMIGS fellows and recent fellowship graduates, including satisfaction, confidence in management, and clinical interest in CPP. DESIGN: The AAGL-Elevating Gynecologic Surgery Special Interest Group for pelvic pain developed a 33-item survey tool to investigate the following topics: (1) current educational experiences with the assessment and management of patients with CPP, (2) satisfaction with fellowship training in CPP, (3) perceived preparedness to treat patients with CPP, (4) plans to incorporate management of CPP into clinical practice, and (5) perceived desires to expand CPP exposure. Composite scores were created to examine experiences related to diseases associated with CPP and pharmaceutical and procedural treatment options. SETTING: Electronic survey. PATIENTS: Not applicable. INTERVENTIONS: The survey was distributed via AAGL email lists and offered on FMIGS social media sites from August 2017 to November 2017 to all active FMIGS fellows and individuals who graduated the fellowship during the preceding 5 years. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: Fifty-three of 82 (65%) current FMIGS fellows and 104 of 169 (62%) recent fellowship graduates completed the survey. Only 66% of current fellows endorsed working with a fellowship faculty member whose clinical work focused on CPP. Most current fellows reported having a "good amount" of experience or "extensive" experience with superficial endometriosis (39/53, 74%) and deeply infiltrative endometriosis (34/53, 64%), whereas the majority reported having "no" or "little" experience with frequently comorbid conditions like irritable bowel syndrome (68%), pelvic floor tension myalgia (55%), and interstitial cystitis/painful bladder syndrome (51%). For both current fellows and recent graduates, increased CPP Disease Experience composite scores were associated with satisfaction with CPP training (current fellows odds ratio [OR] 1.9, p =.002; recent graduates OR 1.5, p < .001), perceived preparedness to treat patients with CPP (current fellows OR 2.0, p = .0021; recent graduates OR 1.5, p <.001), and the desire to incorporate the treatment of CPP into future clinical practice (current fellows OR 1.8, p = .0099; recent graduates OR 1.3, p = .0178). More than 80% (43/53) of current fellows indicated that they believed an expanded pelvic pain curriculum should be part of the FMIGS fellowship. CONCLUSION: This needs assessment of FMIGS fellows and recent graduates suggests that there are gaps between FMIGS curriculum objectives and current educational experiences, and that fellows desire increased CPP exposure. Expansion and standardization of the CPP educational experience is needed and could lead to increased focus on this disease process among subspecialty benign gynecologic surgeons.