IntroductionAs patient volumes continue to increase, more attention must be paid to skills that foster efficiency without sacrificing patient safety. The emergency department is a fertile ground for examining leadership and management skills, especially those that concern prioritization in multi-patient environments. We sought to understand the needs of emergency physicians (EPs) and emergency medicine junior trainees with regards to teaching and learning about how best to handle busy, multi-patient environments.MethodA cognitive task analysis was undertaken, using a qualitative approach to elicit knowledge of EPs and residents about handling busy emergency department situations. Ten experienced EPs and 10 junior emergency medicine residents were interviewed about their experiences in busy emergency departments. Transcripts of the interviews were analyzed inductively and iteratively by two independent coders using an interpretive description technique.ResultsEP teachers and junior residents differed in their perceptions of what makes an emergency department busy. Moreover, they focused on different aspects of patient care that contributed to their busyness: EP teachers tended to focus on volume of patients, junior residents tended to focus on the complexity of certain cases. The most important barrier to effective teaching and learning of managerial skills was thought to be the lack of faculty development in this skill set.ConclusionsThis study presents qualitative data that helps us elucidate how patient volumes affect our learning environments, and how clinical teachers and residents operate within these environments.
Background: Busy environments, like the emergency department (ED), require teachers to develop instructional strategies for coaching trainees to function within these same environments. Few studies have documented the strategies used by emergency physician (EP)-teachers within these busy, chaotic environments, instead emphasizing teaching in more predictable environments such as the outpatient clinic, hospital wards, or operating room. The authors sought to discover what strategies EP-teachers were using and what trainees recalled experiencing when learning to handle these unpredictable, overcrowded, complex, multipatient environments. Method: An interpretive description study was conducted at multiple teaching hospitals affiliated with McMaster University from July 2014 to May 2015. Participants (10 EP-teachers and 10 junior residents) were asked to recall teaching strategies related to handling ED patient flow. Participants were asked to describe techniques that they used, observed, or experienced as trainees. Two independent coders read through interview transcripts, analyzing these documents inductively and iteratively. Results: Two main types of strategies to teach ED management were discovered: 1) workplace-based methods, including both observation and in situ instruction; and 2) principle-based advice. The most often described techniques were workplace-based methods, which included a variety of in situ techniques ranging from conversations to managerial coaching (e.g., collaborative problem-solving of real-life administrative dilemmas). Conclusions: A mix of strategies are used to teach and coach trainees to handle multipatient environments. Further research is required to determine how to optimize the use of these techniques and innovate new strategies to support the learning of these crucial skills. E mergency department (ED) crowding is a persistent international phenomenon. 1,2 Concurrent management of multiple ill patients is a vital skill in emergency medicine (EM), especially given increasing ED patient volumes 3,4 and acuity. 5,6 Recently, research has led to a proposed conceptual framework for physicians' thinking in such complex multipatient environments; 7 however, there is little formal teaching or faculty development around these skills in EM. 4 With the advent of graduated responsibility models such as
The authors propose a conceptual framework for how EPs prioritize care for multiple patients in complex environments. This study may be useful to teachers who train physicians to function more efficiently in busy clinical environments.
The textbook, CanMEDS Physician Health Guide: A Practical Handbook for Physician Health and Well-being, recently published by The Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada sheds light on the depth and scope of the CanMEDS competencies and how they relate to the personal health and the well-being of the medical doctor. This text is the latest addition to a growing library of College publications which serve as professional development resources pertaining to the CanMEDS roles. This particular text has developed a conceptual framework of physician health and evaluates and proposes concise strategies to address personal health issues that any medical student, resident or attending may encounter throughout his career
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