Impact of a teaching strategy for health of the public

Abstract

The advancing crisis in American health care delivery will require medical trainees to understand and have skills in dealing with the multiple socioeconomic factors that affect patient outcome. To initiate this understanding and skill base in medical trainees, a Health of the Public (HOP) faculty development seminar series was instituted so that this material could be role‐modeled and taught to residents and students. The purpose of this study was to ascertain whether this faculty development teaching model leads to behavior change of faculty and trainees in actual patient care situations. Behaviors of HOP ward teams were compared with those of non‐HOP teams by trained observers using a 22‐item curriculum‐based checklist during 393 postcall patient presentations. No significant differences in any of the 22 items were found. Thus, the effectiveness of a “trickle down”; model of educating trainees must be questioned. More intensive and alternative strategies to effect the acquisition and use of HOP skills a...