Minutes

WV RHEP Faculty Development Committee

Monday, December 5, 2005 – Morgantown Nursing Conference room, 10 am – 2:30 pm

Present (for all or part of meeting):

Rosie Cannarella, Eastern Consortium (Chair)

Dan Brody, Western Valley Health Consortium (Vice-Chair)

Penny Asbury, Southern Counties Consortium

Helen Baker, WVSOM

Jill Cochran, Nursing Southern Counties Consortium

Heather Congdan, WVU-Pharmacy

Imogene Foster, WVU-Nursing

Sara Jane Gainor, WVU Geriatrics

Dan Doyle, Gorge Connection Consortium

Gwendolyn Marshall, WVU HSC Faculty Development

Elizabeth Richmond, Southern Counties RHEP

Carla See, WVU Pharmacy

Parr Thacker, Northern AHEC

Crystal Welch, Western Valley Health Ed. Consortium

April Vestal, WV RHEP (via conference call)

1. Decisions about Rural Health Day at WVU HSC

RHEP was allocated time with multiple disciplines in the Auditorium only from 12:30 – 1:30 p.m. on Tuesday, January 24. Decision was needed about whether to attempt to run a “mock IDS” in this time, use another format, or cancel. After exploring alternatives, the Committee decided on a panel format for this program, with the following outline:

11:30 - Food, displays available (will require shortening morning Site Coordinator meeting)

12:00 Introduction – Rosie

12:35 RHEP/AHEC Overview – Parr

12:45 IDS – Dan Doyle if available, if not Rosie or Rosie to appoint

12:55 IDE – describe and give video example – Dan Brody

1:05 Service Learning – Jill

1:15 Wrap up – Rosie

Rosie agreed to let WVU Medicine Academic Dean know that the program is planned (there had been some confusion about this). April agreed to be sure PowerPoint and Video capacity was available.

Decision was made to have meeting of RHEP FD committee meeting in Morgantown the day before this meeting, and therefore Monday, January 22. (Note: Imogene reserved the room, and April has already announced this. Usual meeting will be held 10-3, with meeting with WVU curriculum folks perhaps 3 – 4:30 – see below.)

2. Faculty Development Conference Planning for 2006 and 2007

a) Feedback from the previous conference was reviewed, with the conclusion that the conference generally went well. Some negative comments were received about the hotel’s safety (probably as a result of the power outage and lack of emergency lighting), and a few asked for more interaction rather than lecture.

b) Discussion of whether to hold a conference in Fall 2006, or move date to Spring to avoid conflicts with fall events (most notably football, which caused a major conflict for Dentistry and some others in fall 2005). Decision that March 2007 was preferred date for the major conference. Group asked that April check options/rates in March, specifically starting Friday, March 23, 2007. April was also asked to check with Hilda regarding whether Hilda still had interest in a “national” conference. As possible funding sources, Sara Jane mentioned that “conference” grant money might be available from the CDC and Agency for Health Care Research and Quality, and Parr mentioned a call that Hilda had circulated regarding grants related to Service Learning.

c) Discussion of whether to have some other statewide faculty development event in fall, 2006. Dan Doyle discussed the “teaching communication skills” (TCS) project, and reminded the Committee that they are an advisory group for that Benedum grant. Dan said that he is attempting to move health professions educators in WV towards a shared model for health communication skills, and suggested that RHEP adopt the Kalamazoo Consensus Statement,[1] with seven essential communication skills, as the statewide model for teaching communication skills. Dan reported that he was working with the Primary Care association and the [Bayer] Institute for Healthcare Communications to design a program for non-provide staff, which will probably be held in Charleston in February or March. Committee members suggested that some “by invitation only” model might be used to teach faculty these skills in an interactive format. Helen Baker offered to see if WVSOM’s clinical skills suite might be used for this on a Saturday during the fall semester, noting that several exam rooms can be video-recorded at one time, so participants can review videos of their role-play interactions. The idea was for selected field faculty to be “invited” to a session, resulting in perhaps 30 field faculty for an intensive, interactive session. Baker and Doyle promised to check on this possibility, and report back at the January RHEP FD meeting regarding feasibility. Sara Jane mentioned a possible speaker on competency-based education, and this idea is being held in reserve: while very important to academicians, concern was expressed that this may not be practical enough to interest field faculty.

d) Teaching Scholars modules: Gwen indicated the belief that WVU HSC’s “Teaching Scholars” modules are available to field faculty. Committee members were excited about the possibilities these modules would offer. During a break, Dan Doyle attempted to log onto this site, and could not gain access: Gwen promised to see what could be done to give access to all field faculty, and to report back at the January meeting.

3. Strategic Planning regarding IDS/Service Learning

Dan Brody reported that comments during the November Strategic Planning session led him to the belief that further work needs to be done regarding the role of Service Learning and IDS/IDE in meeting RHEP’s mission: specifically, we need agreement by campus partners and field faculty on what objectives and standards are to be met by the service learning and IDS/IDE components. Committee members discussed challenges and opportunities of service learning and IDS/IDE components. Some members expressed lack of certainty regarding whether RHEP is an educational program; a recruitment program; or a service program. It was noted that we have reported service contacts as a reason for the program’s continuation, but that the wrong service activities may make the project less effective for both education and recruitment. A need was noted for more clearly relating Service Learning and IDS/IDE objectives/activities to discipline-specific program objectives.

The following plan was adopted:

a. April is asked to request from Jodie up-dated evaluation data relevant to the issue (preferably from just the last six months), to see if, as result of last spring’s discussions, the IDS and Service components now have ratings as high as the clinical learning components, or whether these ratings (and related comments) tend to still be more negative. (If ratings are just as high, there is no problem!!)

b. Elizabeth and Crystal agreed to have discussion with Site Coordinators about the feasibility of “fewer activities but of higher quality”.

c. Each Field Faculty member on the committee will discuss this issue with their field-faculty colleagues, to get better understanding of the issue and possible solutions.

d. Brody will invite WVU’s key curriculum leaders to a special session on this, at 3 pm on Monday, January 24. Purpose will be to review current evaluation data and if necessary, to reach agreement on how IDS/IDE/Service Learning components can best relate to discipline-specific objectives.

4. Field Faculty Survey

A survey is a CME requirement, and we haven’t done one for several years. April had successful experience administering the evaluation of the Strategic Planning session using the survey function of SOLE, the distance-learning platform used by WVU: however, the survey would need to be much shorter than what we’ve done in the past. Helen agreed to draft a short survey, with focus on Statewide meeting’s location, days of week, and topics; a budget question; a few medically-related CME questions needed by AHECs (Parr to draft and send to Helen B.); and items about geriatrics (Sara Jane to draft and send to Helen B.).

5. “Levels” policy

Dan Brody asked for an update of the impact of the “levels” policy – the policy that WVU and Marshall medical schools participate in (WVSOM chose not to), that if students go to “Level 3”, very underserved sites, they will be required to spend less time. One site coordinator reported that for one of her field faculty, this had attracted the wrong students: individuals who really did not want to be in a rural environment, and therefore alienated the field faculty member. Some other field faculty, however, were happy that they had a lot of students interested in their site. Dan asked Crystal and Elizabeth to survey other site coordinators regarding the impact of the “Level 3” policy, and report back at our January 24 meeting.

6. Other business

Dan Brody reported that on March 18, he is doing a faculty development program for the Eastern consortium, regarding Oral Health for the peds population.

Meeting ADJOURNED at about 2:30.

Respectfully submitted, Helen Baker

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[1] Greg Makoul, Ph.D., et al, "Essential Elements of Communication in Medical Encounters: The Kalamazoo Consensus Statement," Academic Medicine, April 2001, 76:390-393. Abstract: In May 1999, 21 leaders and representatives from major medical education and professional organizations attended an invitational conference jointly sponsored by the Bayer Institute for Health Care Communication and the Fetzer Institute. The participants focused on delineating a coherent set of essential elements in physician—patient communication to: (1) facilitate the development, implementation, and evaluation of communication-oriented curricula in medical education and (2) inform the development of specific standards in this domain. Since the group included architects and representatives of five currently used models of doctor—patient communication, participants agreed that the goals might best be achieved through review and synthesis of the models. Presentations about the five models encompassed their research base, overarching views of the medical encounter, and current applications. All attendees participated in discussion of the models and common elements. Written proceedings generated during the conference were posted on an electronic listserv for review and comment by the entire group. A three-person writing committee synthesized suggestions, resolved questions, and posted a succession of drafts on a listserv. The current document was circulated to the entire group for final approval before it was submitted for publication. The group identified seven essential sets of communication tasks: (1) build the doctor—patient relationship; (2) open the discussion; (3) gather information; (4) understand the patient's perspective; (5) share information; (6) reach agreement on problems and plans; and (7) provide closure. These broadly supported elements provide a useful framework for communication-oriented curricula and standards.