What questions are in the survey?
Doctors in training and trainers answer different survey questions. Questions are also modified depending on the respondents post to make sure that the survey is relevant to their experiences.
A copy of the current demographic and generic questions for the trainee and trainer surveys can be found in our current survey briefing notes section (please see the annexes of note 3 for the respective question sets). Here you can also find a question bank containing all questions from the trainee survey (2012-2025) and trainer survey (2016-2025). Previous question sets can be found in the resources and briefing archive.
Most questions are used to calculate indicators. Indicators are questions grouped by theme. We report on indicator scores in the reporting tool.
In 2022 and 2023 we revised the questions in the trainer survey and created new indicators. In the light of this change, the 2022 results are listed separately in the 'year on year' report views. 2023 to 2025 results appear together and can be compared.
- We sometimes ask test questions that we would like to report on in the future. This is so we can analyse the answers to make sure the results we get are statistically valid. We don’t report on these questions on the education data tool in the first year.
How are questions grouped and scored?
Questions are grouped by theme to measure how doctors feel about that aspect of training. We refer to these themes as indicators.
The answer to each question is given a numerical value. We average the scores of questions in the indicator to create an indicator score.
How are results grouped?
The indicator score contributes to both the doctor's report group and their benchmark group.
The benchmark group is a larger group used to compare scores from a smaller report group. For example, trainees working in General Psychiatry at Great Ormond Street Hospital would be compared against a benchmark group of General Psychiatry results nationwide.
