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Volume 23 (Suppl)

Volume 23, Supplement 1 line
J Contin Educ Health Prof 2003; 23(suppl):S34-S52
ISSUES INVOLVING PRACTICE-BASED LEARNING AND IMPROVEMENT

Teaching performance improvement: an opportunity for continuing medical education
Staker LV

A b s t r a c t

Practicing physicians generally are not engaged in either the methods of performance improvement for health care or the measurement and reporting of clinical outcomes. The principal reasons are lack of compensation for such work, the perception that the work of performance improvement adds no value and is a waste of time, the lack of knowledge and skill in the use of basic tools for outcomes measurement and performance improvement, the failure of medical educators to teach these skills, and the inability of mentors to model their use in practice. In this article, an overview of the history of quality improvement or performance improvement in general and the adoption of two methods of improvement (Plan-Do-Study-Act and SIX SIGMA) by health care is given. Six simple tools that are easy to understand and use and could be used in every continuing medical education (CME) program are then explained and illustrated. Postgraduate medical educators and CME program directors must step up to the challenge of teaching these skills. By learning to include them in planning, evaluation, policy making, and needs assessments of CME programs, the skills of every physician could be improved. Additional goals of every CME program could be accountability for outcomes, reduction of errors, alignment of incentives, and advocacy for the very best in evidence-based health care. To develop activities that affect physician practice and population health, CME professionals must partner with performance improvement experts for needs assessment and evaluation of outcomes data. An understanding of performance improvement principles helps those in performance improvement and those in CME to determine which educational activities might be expected to influence physician competency and performance.

Lessons for Practice
  • Continuing medical education (CME) programs can teach the use of basic or fundamental tools for performance improvement.
  • The use of the Sigma Metric and run charts or control charts will lead to the development of core competencies in practice-based learning and systems-based practice.
  • Outcomes measurement by the use of some or all of these basic tools could be used in evaluation of effectiveness of CME programs.
  • Planning of CME programs in the future should include instruction related to data collection and the use of one or two of the basic tools for performance improvement for each program.
MeSH Terms: Clinical Competence; Diabetes Mellitus, Type II; Education, Medical, Continuing; Medical Records Systems, Computerized; Teaching

Publication Type: Review
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