Biomedical subjects

Susan Starr

Publications and source records attributed to Susan Starr.

8 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Initial testing of an instrument to measure teacher identity in physicians.

BACKGROUND: A previous study described 7 elements of teacher identity: intrinsic satisfaction from teaching, knowledge and skill about teaching, belonging to a community of teachers, receiving rewards for teaching, believing that being a doctor means being a teacher, feeling a responsibility to teach, and sharing clinical expertise. PURPOSE: To conduct the initial testing of an instrument to measure the 7 elements of teacher identity in clinical educators and to consider the potential applications of such an instrument. METHODS: A 37-item questionnaire was mailed to 153 preceptors of preclinical students. Categories reflected the elements of teacher identity listed here. Demographic data were collected. Means, alphas, ANOVAs, and paired t tests were calculated. RESULTS: Of 153 preceptors, 127 (83%) completed the questionnaire. Cronbach's alpha for the overall scale and several subscales were high. Salaried physicians and those who had completed a faculty development program scored significantly higher on several subscales than physicians who volunteered to teach or who did not have faculty development. CONCLUSIONS: This study provides preliminary evidence that teacher identity can be measured and that preceptors do not respond as a homogeneous group. Assessing teacher identity may be helpful to medical schools looking to identify and support physicians who teach.

Adult↗

PubMed2005

Primary care renewal: regional faculty development and organizational change.

BACKGROUND: Many reports, including the Future of Family Medicine, have called for change in primary care, but few have defined, implemented, and evaluated mechanisms to address such change. The regional, interdisciplinary Primary Care Renewal Project was designed to address problems in primary care practice and teaching related to practice management, compensation, increasing responsibility for teaching, and faculty development. METHODS: Twelve northeastern US medical schools assembled a conference attended by teams of key stakeholders representing both clinical and educational missions. Teams developed and implemented an institutional plan to address identified needs. Outcome data was collected during, and for 1 year after, the conference. RESULTS: Findings demonstrate novel ways of improving learning experiences, coordinating and centralizing planning efforts, and addressing faculty needs. The magnitude of organizational change ranged from establishing new administrative units with significant institutional authority (eg, restructuring dean's office) to enhancing the strategic planning process and refining mission statements to reflect emphasis on primary care. CONCLUSIONS: A well-planned, regional interdisciplinary effort that fosters the development of concrete plans can be associated with significant change in medical education. A central theme emerged--that primary care medicine will survive only if institutions align their educational and clinical missions and foster system-wide change.

Congresses as Topic↗

PubMed2005

Library as place: results of a delphi study.

OBJECTIVE: An expert consensus on the future of the library as place was developed to assist health sciences librarians in designing new library spaces. METHOD: An expert panel of health sciences librarians, building consultants, architects, and information technologists was asked to reflect on the likelihood, desirability, timing, and impact on building design of more than seventy possible changes in the use of library space. RESULTS: An expert consensus predicted that the roles librarians play and the way libraries are used will substantially change. These changes come in response to changes in technology, scholarly communication, learning environments, and the health care economy. CONCLUSIONS: How health sciences library space is used will be far less consistent by 2015, as space becomes more tailored to institutional needs. However, the manner in which health sciences libraries develop and deliver services and collections will drastically change in the next decade. Libraries will continue to exist and will provide support for knowledge management and clinical trials, provide access to digital materials, and play a host of other roles that will enable libraries to emerge as institutional change agents.

Delphi Technique↗

PubMed2003

Community preceptors' views of their identities as teachers.

PURPOSE: Community physicians are increasingly being recruited to teach medical students and residents, yet there has been little research about how they think of themselves as teachers or what factors contribute to "teacher identity." Physicians who think of themselves as teachers may be more likely to enjoy teaching, to teach more, and to be recognized by students and other faculty as good teachers. Identifying factors that enhance teacher identity may be helpful for the recruitment and retention of high-quality community faculty. METHOD: Thirty-five experienced community preceptors were audiotaped in five structured focus groups in April 2001, answering a series of questions about their teacher identity. Responses were qualitatively analyzed for evidence of themes. RESULTS: "Feeling intrinsic satisfaction" was the most common theme that emerged from the tapes. Preceptors also identified that "having knowledge and skill about teaching" and "belonging to a group of teacher" enhanced their roles as teachers. "Being a physician means being a teacher," "feeling a responsibility to teach medicine," and "sharing clinical expertise" also emerged as important themes. Although a group of participants were interested in "receiving rewards for teaching," rewards did not need to be financial compensation. For some, genuine recognition for their efforts by the medical school, particularly in the form of faculty development opportunities, constituted reward and recognition for teaching. CONCLUSIONS: Community physicians described a variety of factors that contribute to their identity as teachers. Faculty development programs offer opportunities to strengthen teacher identity and foster relationships between teaching programs and community-based faculty.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Development and implementation of an objective structured teaching exercise (OSTE) to evaluate improvement in feedback skills following a faculty development workshop.

BACKGROUND: Faculty development programs focusing on teaching have become widespread. PURPOSE: Despite the popularity of such programs, evidence as to their effectiveness is limited. This article reports on the development of an objective structured teaching exercise (OSTE) and its pilot implementation in an evaluation of a faculty development program module. A written test intended to measure feedback skills was also developed and pilot tested. METHODS: A separate-sample, pretest-posttest design was used to pilot test both instruments. RESULTS: The results showed some evidence of significant differences between groups tested preworkshop and postworkshop. Higher scores were observed for the posttest group compared to the pretest group only for OSTE items focusing on prioritizing and limiting the amount of feedback given at one time and on action planning. CONCLUSIONS: Results suggest that an OSTE may be sensitive to changes in preceptor skill level for skills that are relatively easy to incorporate immediately into practice. Lack of differences in other skill areas may be due to lack of sensitivity of the measure or to need for practice and reflection before changes in performance on other feedback skills are evident.

Education, Medical↗

PubMed2002

Using differences between perceptions of importance and competence to identify teaching needs of primary care preceptors.

BACKGROUND: An important goal of a comprehensive faculty development plan is to improve teaching. This is especially important for clinical preceptors. PURPOSE: This study used a novel approach to assessing the teaching needs of preceptors, an essential and often neglected first step in faculty development. Measurement focused on discrepancies between importance and current performance related to a rich variety of teaching behaviors. This study also considered differences in perceived teaching needs among primary care specialties. METHOD: Twenty-six clerkship directors from 13 participating medical schools in the Northeast United States invited randomly selected family medicine, internal medicine, and pediatric preceptors to complete a teaching needs survey. One hundred five preceptors responded. RESULT: Findings revealed that preceptors most need to develop general teaching skills that will help them save time such as selecting appropriate teaching behaviors, assessing learners' needs and providing appropriate feedback, and helping learners learn independently. On the other hand, preceptors expressed less need to improve teaching related to cost containment, disease prevention, clinical decision making, office management, and using computers to aid teaching. Family practice preceptors rated their current teaching performance significantly higher than pediatric preceptors despite no differences in previous faculty development experience. CONCLUSION: Faculty development for preceptors should focus on general teaching skills relative to teaching skills tied to specific medical areas. Novel approaches to teaching while practicing medicine that increase efficiency should be explored. Faculty developers should consider differences in confidence among preceptors from different specialties.

Clinical Clerkship↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Resident preparedness for practice: a longitudinal cohort study.

OBJECTIVE: To determine whether the perception of preparedness for practice changes over time. DESIGN: Questionnaire survey of University of Massachusetts residents 5 years after an initial survey. Responses to individual questions in the 2 surveys were compared for each graduate and the Wilcoxon rank sum test applied. A supplementary questionnaire addressed current confidence in areas with relatively low scores in both surveys. RESULTS: All 24 eligible graduates responded. The high rating of overall sense of preparedness was identical in the 2 surveys. Differences were statistically significant in only 3 categories: common illnesses, office gastroenterology, and office gynecology-all from a lower estimate of preparedness initially to a higher estimate in retrospect. Six areas continued to receive relatively low scores: nutrition, patient scheduling, cost-effectiveness, telephone management, office gynecology, and office orthopedics. Respondents feel more confident currently with nutrition, patient scheduling, and telephone management but not with cost-effectiveness, gynecology, or orthopedics. CONCLUSIONS: Residents paired with office-based practitioners for their continuity experience report feeling well prepared for practice both on practice entry and 5 to 9 years later. In the 6 areas of relatively low preparedness, experience improved confidence with nutrition, patient scheduling, and telephone management, but not cost-effectiveness, gynecology, or orthopedics. The hypothesis that clinical areas of relative weakness at the end of residency may remain so years later deserves to be tested.

Clinical Competence↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Teaching about schools during pediatric residency.

OBJECTIVE: Several published guidelines have suggested that primary care pediatricians include school issues as part of regular health supervision visits. Few residency training programs include systematic education about educational issues that affect children's lives and success in school. The goal of this study was to evaluate a short curriculum on Children In School that was included as part of the 2-month required rotation in developmental-behavioral pediatrics. METHODS: A questionnaire was designed to assess 1) pediatric residents' attitudes about the importance of making school issues part of their practice, 2) pediatric residents' self-perceived knowledge about central concepts, and 3) pediatric residents' self-perceived skills.Participants.-Twenty-one of the 22 pediatric residents in 1 training program completed the questionnaire at the beginning of their first residency year and again during the final 3 months of their third (last) year. RESULTS: Residents assessed that their knowledge and skills relating to children in school were increased consistently (P < .001). Because they considered pediatricians' responsibilities to help improve children's school success to be important even before the program, there was little opportunity for improvement in ratings of "importance" over time. CONCLUSIONS: A relatively short teaching module introduced in the context of the developmental-behavioral pediatrics rotation can improve residents' self-assessed skills and knowledge about children in school.

Adult↗