Residents Are Coming: A Faculty Development Curriculum to Prepare a Community Site For New Learners

AUDIENCE: This curriculum is designed for emergency medicine attendings in varying years of community practice to prepare them for Emergency Medicine (EM) residents LENGTH OF CURRICULUM: 15 months INTRODUCTION: Emergency medicine is a growing field with new residencies approved every year. A strong, competent cadre of clinical educators is essential to the success of any residency, and new programs have the challenge of developing their clinical faculty into outstanding teachers. There is minimal literature guidance for navigating this transition. Our site is a community tertiary care center in the process of applying for an EM residency. We focus on our experience designing a faculty development curriculum to accommodate the needs of a diverse group of physicians in all stages of their careers. We will demonstrate that a curriculum satisfying all stakeholders can easily be implemented in a way that allows for robust participation without excessive additional administrative burden. EDUCATIONAL GOALS: Our goal is to prepare community-based EM attendings to be outstanding educators to future residents by augmenting their knowledge of current educational practice and adult learning theory, literature review, and biostatistics. EDUCATIONAL METHODS: The educational strategies used in this curriculum included lectures, guided discussion, small group discussion, and asynchronous learning. RESEARCH METHODS: This curriculum was implemented in the Geisinger Wyoming Valley Medical center targeted at staff physicians. This educational study was deemed exempt by the institutional review board (IRB). We electronically collected retrospective survey data using a 5-point Likert scale as well as free text responses. The primary measure was agreement with the statement, “Faculty development time makes me feel more prepared to be a clinical educator.” We also surveyed whether this was felt to be an appropriate use of time, self-reported growth in key educational and biostatistical domains, and likeliness to change practice based on the material. RESULTS: Responses collected from core faculty after the sessions indicated a uniformly positive review of the series itself with the primary outcome receiving a 4.6 rating on a 5-point Likert scale (strong agreement). Faculty reported that these brief sessions improved the quality of the departmental staff meetings (average rating 4.7/5). Journal club sessions were rated as positive (4.7/5) and attendees self-reported growth in statistical literacy and security in clinical practice. DISCUSSION: We demonstrated successful implementation of a faculty development curriculum that was favorably assessed by all key stakeholders. Faculty self-reported growth in all educational and clinical domains evaluated. It was successfully implemented without substantially increasing the time burden for physicians with robust clinical and administrative schedules. We feel this is generalizable to other sites seeking to start an EM residency and is useful for sites with existing residencies to efficiently deliver content to junior faculty. TOPICS: Emergency medicine, faculty development, journal club, virtual learning.