Academic emergency medicine : official journal of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine
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"Patient Care" is the first listed core competency of the six new core competencies recently formulated by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) and, arguably, the most important. To assist emergency medicine (EM) program directors in incorporating and assessing this competency, the Council of Emergency Medicine Residency Directors (CORD-EM) held a consensus conference in March 2002. ⋯ In addition, all of the ACGME assessment tools were examined and prioritized for use in assessing the competency of EM residents in the area of patient care. Suggestions for an implementation process are also described.
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This paper reports the proceedings of the discussion panel assigned to look at clinical aspects of quality in emergency medicine. One of the seven stated objectives of the Academic Emergency Medicine consensus conference on quality in emergency medicine was to educate emergency physicians regarding quality measures and quality improvement as essential aspects of the practice of emergency medicine. Another topic of interest was a discussion of the value of information technology in facilitating quality care in the clinical practice of emergency medicine. It is important to note that this is not intended to be a comprehensive review of this extensive topic, but instead is designed to report the discussion that occurred at this session of the consensus conference.
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In February 1999, the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) identified six general competencies as the basic educational goals required by all training programs for their residents. This places emphasis on educational outcome assessment in residency programs and in the accreditation process. A concomitant goal is to have increasingly valid, reliable assessments of the ability of a resident physician to provide safe, evidenced-based, humanistic medical care to their patients. ⋯ This competency is already being well addressed in residency programs, but there has been inadequate documentation of a resident's knowledge base. The Consensus Group focused on many assessment methods to determine those having the best potential for use in EM programs. Assessment methods felt to be most appropriate for assessment of the medical knowledge base of a resident are presented, as are practical suggestions for incorporating these into EM programs.
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The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education's (ACGME's) general competency and outcome assessment initiative (i.e., the ACGME Outcome Project) is an effort to enhance residency education and accreditation effectiveness by increasing emphasis on educational outcomes. The Project is also a response to concerns about new graduates' ability to meet the demands of today's practice environment. ⋯ Outcome assessment will provide evidence of residency program educational effectiveness and information to guide improvement. This paper discusses the development and implementations of assessment methods appropriate to evaluate the performance of residents in each of the core competencies.
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The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) has challenged all residencies with a new paradigm-to teach and evaluate residents based on six core competencies. One of these core competencies is clinical assessment. Standardized patients and direct observation are the most promising for emergency medicine educators to use to assess this competency. There is much room for research and national standardization of methods.