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Project Professionalism

Nationally, there has been a call to integrate professionalism into the medical school formal and informal curricula. The UWSMPH is in the early stages of undertaking a curricular transformation process, with a significant focus on professionalism. In October 2006, it hosted a two-day visit by Doctors Richard and Sylvia Cruess from McGill University to speak to faculty and staff on professionalism. You can view the Cruess presentation online at our Video Library.

We have learned through the Cruess consultation, and our own research of the literature, that teaching students to understand their roles as healer and professional must be taught both explicitly, through didactics and cases, and implicitly, through bedside teaching in the clinical years. UWSMPH is responding by developing a planning committee to address strategies to infuse professionalism at an institutional level.

Early aims include achieving institutional support; identifying leadership and champions; naming a workgroup; defining Professionalism for UWSMPH/Hospital, including an agreement on a common language; raising institutional awareness and promoting the notion of aspiring to be professional; identifying unprofessional practices that threaten a positive learning environment; supporting faculty development, including modeling training; offering experiential learning in the clinical years; incorporating sound evaluation; and endorsing an interdisciplinary team approach. Our goal is to graduate competent and responsible physicians who will be lifelong learners, respectful and trustworthy health care team members, and future role models to the next generation of physicians. An effective strategy will be crucial to achieve this goal.

Current UWSMPH Programs that help enhance professionalism include:

Learning Communities

The UWSMPH Learning Communities, created with designated space in the new building, are made up of five "houses" composed of students from all four classes. Their mission, developed by students, is to "enhance the academic experience of the classroom by offering new opportunities for formal and informal learning, interaction, and socialization." Each house is designed to foster community, leadership, professionalism, well-being and the sharing of knowledge in order to develop more intellectually, socially, physically and emotionally prepared physicians. This mission will be achieved through the following goals: Provide opportunities for peer and professional mentoring and career guidance; Promote the skills and attitudes of professionalism; Develop opportunities for emotional and personal support through recreational and social interactions; Foster development of cross-discipline relationships and interactions.

Each house plans activities designed to foster discussion and debate of different facets of professionalism and to create a forum for vertical interaction across classes around these issues. Their structure creates an ideal setting for facilitating peer to peer and student to faculty interaction which holds great potential for influencing cultural change within the school. For more information, please contact Lynne Cleeland at lmcleela@wisc.edu.

Academic and Career Advising Program (ACAP)

The newly proposed Academic and Career Advising Program (ACAP) is a comprehensive, learning community-integrated advising program that will address medical students’ needs for academic and career advising. Results of graduation and matriculation questionnaires also indicate a student need for more explicit advising programs.

The program plans to integrate several groups of faculty and staff that provide advising services, including emeritus faculty, academic staff, basic science faculty, clinical faculty, the department of Student Academic Development, counseling services, the Office of the Omsbud, research mentors, and alumni. Three faculty mentors will be assigned to each learning community, two clinical and one basic science. ACAP will use the existing house structure to deliver advising and mentoring activities more efficiently. The program will address students’ academic and career advising questions; refer students to other resources when appropriate; facilitate networking with other clinical faculty, especially in students’ areas of interest; and serve as a resource for students and other advisors on specialty-specific knowledge. The ACAP will allow all students access to physician faculty mentors throughout medical education, instilling professional role modeling and career input. For more information, please contact Chris Stillwell at cmstillw@wisc.edu.

Gold Humanism Honor Society

In September 2006, UWSMPH received a grant from the Arnold P. Gold Foundation to institute a chapter of the Gold Humanism Honor Society (GHHS), which has as its mission to perpetuate the tradition of the caring doctor by emphasizing the importance of the practitioner-patient relationship. The foundation’s objective is to help physicians-in-training combine the high-tech skills of cutting-edge medical science and technology with the high-touch skills of communication, empathy and compassion. For more information, contact Sharon Younkin at slyounkin@wisc.edu.

Indiana Immersion Conference

In an effort to address the "hidden" or informal curricula here at UWSMPH, Academic Affairs and members of the IME submitted an application to attend the Relationship-Centered Care Initiative Immersion Conference II at the Indiana University School of Medicine in May '07. UWSMPH was one of eight schools chosen to participate.

The purpose of the conference is to: Understand the culture of medical education’s informal curricula, including how values are taught in daily interactions; Review approaches in initiating culture change; and Outline a strategy to enhance professionalism within our institution. The conference will help UWSMPH coalesce plans for a school- wide initiative to address professionalism and climate issues among faculty, staff and students.

Additional Links and Readings:

For more information, please contact Roberta Rusch at rrusch@wisc.edu