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Review of an Intensive Faculty Development Program Conducted at a Regional Medical Campus.

Purpose: The process of attracting, training, and retaining adjunct clinical faculty can be a challenge for regional medical campuses. It is important to have a faculty development program that addresses the specific needs of community-based faculty members. However, there is a shortage of literature on how to best develop and deliver such programs at regional campuses. Objective: to describe the development and implementation of a comprehensive faculty development program at a regional medical campus. Method: An intensive faculty development program was developed at the regional medical campus of a large US Midwestern medical school. The faculty development program was directed by a senior faculty member at the regional medical campus working with a senior educator from the medical education office on the main campus. The program expanded the number of yearly faculty development workshops offered to all faculty at the regional campus and specifically included an intensive two-year program for 12 faculty teaching scholars. The two-year Teaching Scholars program entailed additional meeting sessions along with assignments, readings, and the scholars’ commitment to incorporate session content into practice. Results: Teaching scholars maintained regular session attendance. Self-assessed knowledge and skills in completing common teaching activities improved for participating faculty across the study period. All participating faculty rated the program good (18%) to excellent (82%) and all indicated they would recommend the program to colleagues. Conclusions: The described program can be accomplished by any regional medical campus working with faculty experts at the main campus. The financial costs of the program were minimal, and data from the program supported its benefits.

Stepping up to the plate: An unexpected leadership opportunity during the Covid 19 pandemic

A regional campus graduate communicates in this piece her experience during the initial period of the COVID 19 pandemic. Her words highlight the importance of the “sense of place” that is the unifying theme of this rural regional campus.1 She worked 3 years in our college rural scholar program and ultimately wrote the best summary of the community aspect of this experience.2 She then completed our prematriculation and preclinical programs, and graduated from our clinical campus in 2015. She then completed an OB/Gyn residency at Geisenger, and returned home to practice, where she serves as a key faculty for our clerkship. William J. Crump, M.D. Associate Dean, University of Louisville SOM Trover Campus

Returning to a ‘New Normal’ in Regional Campus Research Laboratories during the COVID-19 Pandemic

In the spring of 2020, the worldwide biomedical sciences community anticipated a need to return to critical laboratory research prior to the end of the COVID-19 pandemic. Models for accomplishing recovery from a worldwide disaster are mostly found in the business realm. In the pandemic situation, literature focuses on how governments or clinical care settings can best respond. Very few guidelines exist for accomplishing the resumption of academic biomedical research, particularly for basic science laboratories and programs. A U.S. regional medical campus can be in a unique situation if it must follow the return-to-work dictates of the larger institution, and yet have different challenges and potential advantages from its parent institution. We present a model used by one such regional medical campus in order to navigate the resumption of laboratory research activities after COVID-19 driven operations shutdown. This model allowed us to accomplish our target of a rapid yet smooth return to the “new normal” way of executing laboratory research, although our success in mitigating SARS-CoV-2 transmission is an outcome that we cannot yet know. Templates for materials used in the resumption of laboratory activities are provided. The lessons learned in our experience of laboratory restart go beyond the current pandemic.

Understanding the needs of rural preceptors from groups underrepresented in medicine

Introduction Community preceptors are essential in providing sufficient training opportunities for health professional students. Recently, focus has been given to the recruitment of community preceptors from groups underrepresented in medicine (UiM) for their contibutions in training a diverse and culturally competent workforce. The overall goal of this study is to review data collected from UiM preceptors and potential preceptors for unique beliefs or values that reveal their motivation for teaching. We hypothesize that community preceptors from groups underrepresented in medicine hold beliefs reflective of high levels of altruism and service. Methods This is a retrospective study of interview data collected from UiM community preceptors for developing clinical education experiences. We sought to uniquely understand the needs of these preceptors in order to develop our recruitment strategy. Each participant agreed to a structured interview and gave or denied permission to have the interview recorded. In the structured interview, community physicians were asked to answer questions about their motivation to precept medical and physician assistant students. They were further asked about their desired compensation, reservations about teaching, and interest in participating in curricular development. Results We interviewed 12 community providers- 11 physicians and one advanced practice nurse. Participants were from a broad range of specialties: Obstetrics/Gynecology (3), Surgery (3), Psychiatry (3), Family Medicine (1), Pediatrics (1), Emergency Medicine (1). Of the providers interviewed, 10 were from groups underrepresented in medicine. All 10 of the UiM participants were physicians. All participants completed the structured interview. The answers provided in the interview were able to be grouped into themes reflecting a recurring set of beliefs and motivations. Conclusions UiM preceptors hold values reflective of altruism and a willingness to serve in the creation of the future workforce. We have found UiM preceptors possess a strong desire for training as educators. Further, UiM preceptors are incentivized by financial compensation and willing to commit their personal time to advising the medical school.

Imagination, the first virtual meeting

Two regional medical school faculty have a meeting of the minds as they seek ways to stop the spread of COVID-19. A combination of expertise and imagination resulted in entertaining kid-friendly information to promote COVID-19 awareness and prevention practices. What started as a seemingly small health promotion project for children quickly blossomed into an impactful, far-reaching venture that cuts across distance, cultures, and disciplines as the resources travel regionally and internationally, are translated to multiple languages, and evolve into new, cutting edge COVID-19 research and innovative methods of providing supportive services for youth in a Native American community.

A Regional Campus Approach to Culinary Medicine for Interprofessional Students

Purpose The purpose of this report is to describe and discuss an innovative culinary medicine interprofessional student educational project through collaboration with community partners. Method After adapting the culinary medicine program to meet interprofessional education requirements, students from interprofessional graduate healthcare programs on a regional medical campus participated in a culinary medicine active learning experience utilizing the Goldring© curriculum. For this project, students completed assigned readings prior to the hands-on culinary experience which utilized a patient case scenario and an educational debrief. Anonymous post-survey quantitative and qualitative data was collected to determine the students’ opinions of the learning experience and the application of the information learned for patient care. Results Thirty-three students from medicine, pharmacy, physical therapy, nursing, radiologic imaging science, and genetic counseling participated. The project consisted of three separate events, entailing the same learning experience. The students reported the learning experience to be highly valuable. Qualitative data analysis revealed three general themes: 1) the novelty of the information learned, 2) the relevance of the information for patients from the perspective of all disciplines represented in the learning experience, and 3) the value of teamwork. Conclusions Collaboration with a local community culinary arts school provided a unique and innovative learning opportunity for regional campus healthcare students. The focus of the culinary medicine learning experience to include interprofessional students created a rich learning environment allowing students to learn from, with, and about other healthcare disciplines in addition to practical application of culinary medicine. The culinary medicine program’s combination of didactic and culinary skills training was well received by students. Students had a positive response to the curriculum and experience stating that they learned information that they were excited to implement with their patients. To our knowledge UAMS Northwest Regional Campus is the first to implement culinary medicine curriculum with IPE requirements, and it is the first regional medical campus to implement the Goldring© curriculum.

Neurology Telemedicine as Virtual Learning: A Student’s Perspective

Small rural regional medical school campuses can be challenged to provide the breadth of learning opportunities required in some specialties. Here we report our initial experience with a telemedicine stroke consultation service that addressed one of our concerns. We share an essay from the student perspective as well as those of the regional dean and remote neurology faculty and encourage others to try this technology and report their findings. The authors have no conflict of interest to report and this study was found to be exempt by the Baptist Health Madisonville Internal Review Board.

Advance Care Planning and Advance Directives Completion of Elderly Patients at a Rural Health Clinic on a Regional Medical Campus

Advance care planning is the shared decision-making process between physicians, patients, and families regarding the patient’s preferences for end of life care. These conversations increase compliance with patient wishes, decrease hospitalizations, increase deaths in patient’s preferred location, and decrease depression in surviving family members3. Even though there is proven benefit from advance care planning, these discussions are often overlooked. The purpose of this study is to evaluate rates of advance care planning and advance directive completion rate of 245 geriatric patients at our rural health clinic training site. We searched the electronic medical record to determine the number of patients who were asked about advance directives, stated they had a living will or medical power of attorney (MPOA), and had a living will or MPOA scanned into their chart. Out of the study population, 45% of patients stated they had some form of advanced directives. Of these patients, 22% and 25% had a living will and MPOA scanned into their chart, respectively. This study demonstrates the need for detailed discussion about advanced care planning with patients and additional follow-up to ensure documentation is readily available.

Novel Methodology for Recruitment of High School Students to Health Professions

Medical schools are creating programs to introduce careers in healthcare to students at earlier stages in their education. At the Penn State College of Medicine University Park Regional Campus, we have created and implemented a novel improvisational, case-based, small-group learning curriculum for high school students to introduce integrative thinking in basic and clinical sciences and to cultivate an early interest in health professions careers. The program also includes elements of health systems science and humanities. A multidisciplinary team of educators with both secondary and post-secondary pedagogical expertise worked together to develop a longitudinal case-based curriculum suitable for high school students. This curriculum was administered to a group of 40 students in grades 9-12. At the start of each session, students were challenged to explore personal biases, reflect upon ethical dilemmas, and to step outside their comfort zones with “centering exercises.” Through these activities, we strived to challenge the learners’ preconceptions about their colleagues, medicine, and their role within it. Students were then presented with a case as a large group. At critical junctures in the cases, students worked in small groups of 8-10 with 1-2 medical student facilitators to discuss questions and solve clinical dilemmas associated with the case. Early feedback from students and faculty advisors has been overwhelmingly positive. The authors have no conflicts of interest.