Education Committee
Chair, Education Committee
Mary Ottolini, MD, MPHChildren's National Medical Center
5600 Griffith Road
Gaithersburg, MD 20882
Tel: 202/884-3938
Fax: 202/884-4741
mottolin@cnmc.org
Education Committee Tasks
- Develop an annual educational agenda for APA and submit to Board for approval.
- Create task forces to implement annual agenda and appoint leaders for key activities.
- Provide follow-up on past projects: e.g., support continuing development, evaluation and dissemination of the Educational Guidelines for Pediatric Residency.
- Lead the APA Faculty Development Program in collaborationwith the Faculty Development SIG.
- Participate in planning for the Academic Pediatric Generalist fellowship accreditation program.
- Choose topic, submit abstract and conduct committee-sponsored workshop for PAS.
- Communicate with larger membership of the Education Committee about new opportunities and activities.
- Write articles on current activities for the APA newsletter.
- Plan and maintain committee webpage on the APA website.
- Review abstracts for PAS workshops.
- Review abstracts for PAS presentations.
- Assist with selection of the annual APA Teaching Award (to programs) and Young Investigator Award.
- Choose annual winner of Helfer Award (to individuals, based on submitted abstracts in the education domain) Oversee Miller/Sarkin Mentoring Award process Represent the APA at the AAP Committee on Pediatric Education (COPE).
Plan for spring PAS meeting:
- Report to the Board
- Educ committee meeting agenda
- Committee-sponsored workshop
- FD Program activities
December 2009, Education Committee Chair's Message
Newsletter Article
I have felt that the APA is my academic home since attending my first APA meeting in 1990. The wonderful opportunities for mentoring, skill building and collaborative work have been essential to any success I have achieved as a clinician-educator. As Education Committee Chair I am fortunate to work with outstanding APA educators on a variety of projects that cut across all levels of trainees and all clinical settings. I think that the APA can serve as the mortar that bridges gaps between pediatric educators teaching in various settings so that we can all benefit from our collective knowledge and skill. By working together with COMSEP, APPD and COPS on curricula, learning resources and evaluation strategies we can help trainees to bridge transitions in training more seamlessly; resulting in better patient care.
Committee Chair
Mary C. Ottolini MD, MPH
mottolin@cnmc.org
December 2009, Committee Report
Newsletter Article
Educational Guidelines:
Teri Turner is currently leading a "Transition Team" to determine how to update the APA Educational Guidelines for residency training in pediatrics to make them as useful as possible to residents and program directors. Ideas suggested include expanding the scope of the guidelines to include generalist fellowship program competencies, as well as linking competencies to learning resources and evaluations strategies. Drs. Turner and Mary Ottolini are working together to further develop. At the current time we are updating the site so that additional modules may be added for Global Health, EBM, Substance Abuse, etc. We await news regarding the ACGME Milestone project before proposing any fundamental changes to the site.
Educational Scholars Program
The ESP is currently selecting 18 scholars for its fourth cohort. Associate Program Directors were targeted for recruitment this year. The first cohort graduated at the PAS meeting in May 2009. The second and third cohorts are working on their intersession distance learning modules. 24 scholars, mostly pediatric hospitalists are in the third cohort. The second cohort of ten scholars was supported by the Dyson foundation and is therefore focused on scholarly educational projects related to educating trainees in the community setting.
PEEAC Was A Success!
The first joint educational meeting for clinician-educators teaching trainees across the continuum from medical student to fellow level and in clinical settings varying from primary care ambulatory to intensive care units was held on September 11 and 12th at the Westin Arlington Gateway Hotel.
The meeting was a tremendous success thanks to the 130 participants, 28 faculty and organizational leadership of the APA, COMSEP, APPD and CoPS. Faculty members were nationally recognized educational leaders from their respective organizations. The faculty provided evidence of their commitment to promoting pediatric educational excellence by the outstanding workshops on curriculum development, teaching strategies, evaluation tools and development of educational scholarship for career advancement.
Each faculty member paid their own way to attend the meeting. Faculty members also facilitated and provided advice during small group networking/problem-solving sessions. The meeting planning committee leader was Maryellen Gusic with Mary Ottolini from the APA and leadership from each of the participating organizations: COMSEP, Bill Raszka and Chris White; APPD, Susan Guralnick and Rob McGregor; CoPS Vicki Norwood. The keynote address was given by Lewis First entitled Some "First" Impressions on Medical Education: How to Help This "Patient" Not Just Survive But Thrive.
Handouts and slides from each presentation are posted on the PEEAC.org meeting website. Planning committee members plan to publish proceedings from the meeting.
Pediatric Hospitalist Annual Meeting:
The 5th Annual Pediatric Hospitalist Meeting was held July 23-26 at the Tampa Marriott Waterside Hotel and was a big success with over 300 Pediatric Hospitalists attending. Attendees participated in a variety of workshops covering clinical, practice management, academic, and quality and safety topics. In addition, hospitalists had a chance to share research findings at poster and plenary sessions. Networking and mentoring opportunities were also available. The ongoing work on strategic initiatives identified at the Hospitalist Roundtable Meeting by the four work groups were discussed. 4 Work Groups (Research, Education, Workforce/Clinical Care and Quality/Safety) will undertake the following Strategic Initiative projects over approximately 16-18 months under the guidance of work group leaders:
- Undertake environmental assessment of PHM participation on key quality and safety committees, societies, and agencies to ensure appropriate PHM representation in liaison and/or leadership positions.
- Create a plan for a QI collaborative by assessing the needs and resources available; identify 2 problems and implement solutions which will improve care for children hospitalized with common conditions treated by PHM physicians through use of this collaborative network
- Develop an educational plan supporting the PHM Core Competencies addressing both hospitalist training needs including the role as formal educators
- Create a clinical practice monitoring dashboard template for use at PHM hospitals and practices
- Develop a descriptive statement which can be used by any PHM which defines the field of PHM and answers the question "who are we"?
- Develop a communications tool describing "value added" of PHM
- Develop a tool to assess career satisfaction among PHM physicians, with links to current SHM work in this area
- Create a collaborative research entity by re-structuring the existing research network and formalizing relationships with affiliated networks
- Create a pipeline/mentorship system to increase the number of PHM researchers
- Formalize an organizational infrastructure for oversight and guidance of PHM Strategic Planning Roundtable efforts with clear delineation of the relationships with the AAP, APA, and SHM.
Hospitalist Competencies
The Pediatric Hospital Medicine Core Competencies were created to help define the roles and expectations for pediatric hospitalists, regardless of the practice setting. Because the burden of chronic illness is lower in pediatrics compared to adult medicine, there is more variability in the focus of clinical practice among pediatric hospitalists compared to adult hospitalists. Furthermore, although most children requiring hospitalization in the United States are hospitalized in community settings, children with complex, chronic medical problems are more likely to be hospitalized at a tertiary care or academic institutions. In order to unify pediatric hospitalists who work in different practice environments, the Pediatric Hospital Medicine Core Competencies were constructed to represent the knowledge, skills and attitudes that all pediatric hospitalists can be expected to acquire and maintain. Because pediatric hospitalists commonly work to improve the systems of care in which they operate and may play a major role in the education of trainees and colleagues, the Pediatric Hospital Medicine Core Competencies include both clinical and non-clinical topics. Finally, the Pediatric Hospital Medicine Core Competencies are also intended to provide a framework for the education and evaluation of both physicians-in-training and practicing hospitalists.
Defining the Pediatric Hospital Medicine Core Competencies has been somewhat of a moving target as the specialty has evolved over the past six years. Work began at the first Pediatric Hospital Medicine meeting in San Antonio in November 2003, where the major focus of the meeting was defining who we are and what we do. Following that inaugural meeting, development of the competencies progressed in fits and starts, mirroring the clinical "systole-diastole" work cycle of Pediatric Hospitalists. The process ultimately culminated in the production of the Pediatric Hospital Medicine Core Competencies document, which contains XX chapters on clinical and systems topics integral to the practice of pediatric hospital medicine. The development process has been deliberately inclusive and collaborative, with contributions from XX authors and editors, each with a clinical or administrative area of expertise.
The competencies were modeled after the style of the Society for Hospitalist Medicine's adult core competencies. Many similar topics were chosen as chapter competencies and the competency domains were divided into Knowledge, Skills and Attitudes. The final core competency content topics were vetted through the leadership of the three organizations that comprise Pediatric Hospitalist Medicine; the Academic Pediatric Association, the AAP and SHM. As the scope and focus of the field of Pediatric Hospitalist Medicine continues to evolve additional sections such as sedation and transport medicine were added to the original list of core topics.
Each of the 54 competency topics or "chapters" is listed beneath one of four sections. The first two sections: Common Clinical Diagnoses and Conditions, and Core Skills represent the fundamental requirements for meeting the needs of most hospitalized pediatric patients. The section entitled Specialized Clinical Services encompasses clinical competencies that all PH should be familiar with, but the degree of competence needed is variable, depending upon the needs of the institution. For example, all PH should be able to stabilize a critically ill child for transport, but knowledge of how to adjust ventilation based upon change in altitude would only be expected if one were a member of an air transport team. The final section Healthcare Systems: Supporting and Advancing Child Health includes non-clinical competencies needed to manage and lead Hospitalist divisions, multidisciplinary groups and larger organizations to effect change and improve quality.
The competencies in each chapter are divided into Knowledge, Skills, Attitudes and Systems Organization and Improvement to be consistent with the organizational structure of the Internal Medicine Hospitalist Core Competencies. The traditional six ACGME competencies of Medical Knowledge and Patient Care are imbedded within the Knowledge and Skill sections, while Communication and Professionalism are listed in the Attitude section. Practice-Based Learning and Systems-based practice are found under Systems Organization and Improvement section.
Education Chair
Mary Ottolini MD, MPH
Mottolin@cnmc.org
