Tessa Cocchio, left, and Karee Moffatt, Competence by Design coordinators in medicine and pediatrics respectively, are presenting a workshop at the International Conference on Residency Education.
Competency by Design (CBD) is transforming the way medical education is delivered in the Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry and Karee Moffatt and Tessa Cocchio are preparing to help those succeed through this time of change.
Moffatt and Cocchio, CBD coordinators in pediatrics and medicine respectively, are presenting a 75-minute workshop for program administrators at the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada Program Administrator's Conference (held in conjunction with the International Conference on Residency Education) about how these staff members can engage faculty in competency based medical education.
"We want to empower program administrators to feel like they have a role in faculty engagement and how to enhance it. We want them to be able to help their own programs succeed in CBD and through the transition," says Cocchio.
CBD focuses on outcomes of residents and not their linear progress. It judges residents based on their abilities rather than their knowledge and introduces a hybrid model of competency-based medical education to learning and assessment in residency and specialty practice across Canada. The goal of CBD is to enhance patient care by improving specialist training and lifelong learning, ensuring physicians demonstrate the skills and behaviours required to continuously meet evolving patient needs. The Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada began rolling out implementation of CBD in 2017.
Moffatt and Cocchio are also involved in a research project with the Post Graduate Medical Education (PGME) office and eight departments within the Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry. It focuses on exploring knowledge use and attitudes towards staff development resources created to support implementation of competency based medical education. They want to know what communication tools work best in disseminating the information whether it be lunch and learns, posters, newsletters or emails.
"We are trying to find different ways to connect with faculty while finding out if what we have already been doing has been working for them. What we would like to do is assemble a toolkit that we could take to ICRE in 2020 and have the data to back it up and why it works," explains Moffatt.
Cocchio adds that through the research, they will have a better understanding on where to financially direct resources since the goal is to have the tools used by other universities. "We're trying to come up with tools that don't cost a lot of money and don't take a lot of time. We want to provide program administrators with the templates so all they have to do is fill in their home program branding and details," she says.
Nicole Firth and Erin Blazey, education program supervisor and general pediatrics program administrator respectively, are also presenting at the conference. Their topic is A year at a glance - 365 days of resident wellness.