Teaching styles in the faculty-resident relationship.

As part of an effort to train family physicians to be more effective teachers in family medicine, a teaching styles workshop program was developed. The aim of the program is to help physician teachers to become more flexible in matching a teaching style to a particular teaching context. The program consists of three components: (1) a scheme for classifying teaching behaviors as belonging to one of the four basic styles identified, (2) videotaped models of each of the four basic styles, and (3) structured role playing by workshop participants in which the four styles are practiced and critiqued. The program, as used in two different sets of faculty development workshops, is described and recommendations for its use by others given.

The hospital work of a family practice group in a medium size community in New England.

This study examines the hospital work of four family physicians in group practice in a community of 45,000 in north central Massachusetts. During the study year, these four physicians assumed primary management responsibility for 1,021 hospitalizations for an average of 255 admissions per physician. Most admissions (98 percent) were to a 242-bed community hospital, and these 997 admissions were studied in detail. Obstetrical admissions accounted for 21 percent of the total (not counting newborns), with 169 deliveries. Pediatric admissions (newborn to age 21 years) accounted for 42 percent of the total. Sixteen percent were patients over 65 years of age. One or more consultations were requested in 14 percent of the admissions. Some form of cardiovascular disease constituted the most frequent discharge diagnoses, with newborn care and pregnancy related diagnoses second and third. The four physicians were compared to each other for variables including age/sex profile, discharge diagnoses, length of stay, consultations requested, and admission ratio per ambulatory encounter. In spite of their differences in training and length of time in practice, the four physicians were found to be similar to one another on most of these dimensions.

Documentation of inpatient clinical experience of family practice residents: a manual system.

A simple, efficient, and inexpensive system for quantitatively documenting the range of clinical experience of individual residents on inpatient rotations is described. Information provided by this system can be used by program faculty to make informed educational decisions concerning both the design of rotations and individual resident program planning. The data are also useful to residency graduates to document their clinical experience when applying for hospital privileges.