In health professions education, the stakes are profoundly high. Learners are preparing for careers where every decision directly impacts patient well-being, demanding a culture of excellence, continuous improvement, and rigorous evaluation. In this high-stakes environment, feedback is not a luxury—it is the lifeblood of professional development.

While guidance from experienced faculty members is essential for transmitting foundational knowledge and clinical expertise, it represents only one angle of evaluation. For learners to thrive and prepare for the collaborative realities of modern healthcare, peer feedback is an indispensable tool. Healthcare operates on interprofessional teams, and learning to both give and receive constructive criticism from colleagues is a core competency that must be cultivated long before residency or professional practice begins. Peer evaluations help learners gain valuable, authentic insight into their performance within a team context, guiding their self-correction and accelerating their learning process.

At Elentra, our team is composed of healthcare professionals and experts who have seen firsthand the transformative advantages of learners receiving peer feedback. By evaluating one another, learners develop skills that are crucial in complex healthcare settings because they directly influence team dynamics and, ultimately, patient outcomes. Studies have demonstrated that structured peer assessment may be more accurate than faculty evaluation in assessing certain professional competencies due to the frequency of peer-to-peer observation¹.

Here is a closer look at the profound impact peer feedback has on the development of future healthcare professionals.

Enhances Clinical Learning Outcomes

Peer feedback offers a unique perspective that faculty evaluations often cannot match. When learners receive feedback from those currently undergoing the same training, it is often viewed as more immediately relevant and actionable. This feedback helps learners see their work from different, yet equally acute, viewpoints. It encourages them to actively think about and evaluate their own and their peers' clinical reasoning, procedural skills, and professional behaviors.

When learners get feedback from their peers, it helps them understand the subject matter better and internalize new ways to approach complex problems. For example, a student evaluating a peer’s simulated patient interview might notice a subtle cue the peer missed, reinforcing their own vigilance. This process not only clarifies the learning objectives but also promotes a deeper engagement with the material, leading to improved clinical judgment and diagnostic accuracy in the long run.

Promotes Essential Communication and Interpersonal Skills

The ability to communicate clearly and work effectively within a team is absolutely critical in every health profession. Poor communication is a known contributor to medical error and adverse patient events.

When learners give feedback to each other, they learn to share their thoughts and concerns in a clear, supportive, and helpful way—a skill directly transferable to interprofessional consultation and difficult conversations with patients or families. At the same time, they also learn how to receive feedback politely and professionally, managing the emotional response that often accompanies criticism.

This practice allows them to refine essential interpersonal skills such as active listening, empathy, and diplomacy. Medical education research confirms that peer feedback is a valuable technique for developing communication skills². These qualities are invaluable in healthcare settings where effective communication can directly affect patient safety and team cohesion. By practicing giving and receiving feedback, learners build the professional maturity required for high-functioning clinical teams.

Fosters Critical Thinking and Self-Reflection

Participating in the peer feedback process requires learners to step into an evaluator role, which demands higher-order cognitive skills. To provide valuable feedback, a learner must think deeper, evaluate evidence carefully against established competencies (such as Entrustable Professional Activities or EPAs), and make logical, objective arguments to support their critique.

Critiquing a colleague’s performance forces a learner to consciously apply the same standards to their own work. This commitment to objective self-evaluation is the cornerstone of lifelong learning and continuous professional development (CPD) in medicine. Peer assessment is widely shown to improve metacognitive and self-reflection skills, helping students identify knowledge gaps and reinforcing positive behavior^{1, 3}. This helps them identify personal biases and blind spots—a vital habit for mitigating risk and ensuring quality care throughout their careers.

Builds Professional Confidence and Empowerment

While feedback is challenging, constructive criticism from peers helps learners develop a sense of agency and self-efficacy. They learn that improvement is expected and achievable, which is vital for building resilience. Successfully processing and acting upon peer comments helps learners grow and become more confident in their developing abilities.

This process boosts their self-belief and contributes to a positive learning environment where everyone is motivated to take an active role in their education. Furthermore, being recognized by their peers for a particular strength can be a powerful affirmation of their professional identity. Ultimately, this confidence and self-awareness translate into competent, compassionate, and resilient healthcare professionals.

Streamlining Peer Feedback: The Elentra Advantage

The effectiveness of peer feedback hinges on the quality and objectivity of the process. For institutions managing hundreds of learners, clinical sites, and competency assessments, implementing a robust peer feedback mechanism poses significant logistical challenges, including ensuring anonymity, tracking feedback compliance, and aligning evaluations with curriculum objectives.

Research strongly suggests that for peer assessment to be effective, clear rubrics, rater training, and a structured tool are essential components⁴. This is where a unified, enterprise software platform becomes crucial. Elentra is designed specifically for the unique needs of health professions education, providing the tools necessary to make peer assessment effective and scalable:

• Objective Alignment: Feedback forms can be seamlessly linked to specific learning objectives, competencies, and accreditation standards or activities, ensuring every evaluation is purposeful.
• Convenience and Compliance: The Elentra Mobile App allows learners and faculty to complete assessments and provide feedback in real-time at the point of care or interaction, drastically improving compliance rates and timeliness.
• Centralized Tracking: Elentra provides the tools for learners to give and receive feedback as well as tools for appropriate parties to assess performance (including ePortfolios and performance dashboards) and collect feedback from peers and faculty in addition to learners' own self-assessments. These things all provide a holistic view of professional development and growth over time.

At Elentra, we know you have one of the most important jobs: educating our future healthcare professionals. We are committed to providing the infrastructure that empowers effective, competency-based education. If you’d like to learn how you can help your students improve their overall performance with a structured, effective peer feedback system—contact us today.

References

1. Lerchenfeldt, S., Mi, M. & Eng, M. (2019). The utilization of peer feedback during collaborative learning in undergraduate medical education: a systematic review. BMC Medical Education, 19, 321. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-019-1755-z
2. Janesarvatan, F., & Asoodar, M. (2024). Constructive peer-feedback to improve language and communication skills in medical education. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 18(5), 387–401. https://doi.org/10.1080/17501229.2024.2311834
3. Abraham, R., & Singaram, V. S. (2024). Self and peer feedback engagement and receptivity among medical students with varied academic performance in the clinical skills laboratory. BMC Medical Education, 24, 1065. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-024-06084-9
4. Double, K. S., McGrane, J. A., & Hopfenbeck, T. N. (2020). The Impact of Peer Assessment on Academic Performance: A Meta-analysis of Control Group Studies. Educational Psychology Review, 32, 481–509. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-019-09510-3