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Assessment/Performance Improvement

The faculty and leadership at Rutgers Health/NJMS EM strongly believes that teaching is one of our core missions. We believe that:

  • Becoming a physician and mastering the practice of Emergency Medicine is a lifelong endeavor
  • There is always room for improvement
  • Continued improvement is only possible with effective feedback
  • Not everyone learns the same way

Over the past few years we have updated and introduced multiple mechanisms to allow for every resident to succeed.

  • Routine Feedback to the Resident
    • Shift Cards: At the end of each shift residents are encouraged to request an end-of-shift evaluation and verbal feedback from faculty. The evaluations have been revised recently to reflect the EM Milestones, while still being practical and providing actionable feedback, as opposed to just checkboxes.
    • Rotation Evaluations: Off-service rotations provide residents with feedback in the form of an evaluation at the end of the block.
    • Clinical Competency Committee: Comprised of diverse faculty and nurses, the CCC meets quarterly to discuss and document the performance of residents in the clinical arena
    • Semi-Annual Reviews: The residency leadership team meets collectively with each resident every six months. Unlike most programs we do this as a team review to enhance effectiveness and ensure a diversity of opinions. These reviews also serve as a "check-in" related to non-clinical issues such as intraining exam performance, career plans, research and wellness.
    • Advising: Each resident is assigned a faculty advisor that they can use as an individual resource. In addition residents are assigned to houses/families which include residents of different levels and multiple faculty members. Incoming residents are also assigned a Big Sibling to support their transition into residency. Finally, based on personal and professional interests we work with residents to identify and work with faculty mentors.
  • Individualized Learning
    • 1:1 coaching with PDs: Residents meet individually with one of the program directors 2-3 times/year in sessions dedicated personalized coaching related to clinical scenarios. These are not conducted in an oral-boards style or evaluative manner, rather in a conversational and algorithm building fashion that includes reflection and advice on clincal challenges the resident may be facing.
    • Pre-graduation coaching: Fouth-year residents are assigned individual faculty coaches that work with residents on fine-tuning their skillset as they prepare for independent practice.
    • Individualized Learning Plan: Each resident is encouraged to develop and update an Individualized Learning Plan with the residency leadership. Broadly this is intended to target academic, clinical and research performance with measurable outcomes. This also serves as a career planning mechanism to ensure that a resident maintains perspective on long-term goals.
    • Individualzed Educational Plan: Based on specific identified deficits/areas of concern (low intraining exam score, poor procedural performance, etc.) a resident works with the residency leadership to develop a focused, short-term intervention. Frequent follow-up sessions are held to ensure progress on the plan.
  • Board Preparation
    • All residents receive access to Rosh Review (question bank) for intraining exam preparation
    • Additional board preparation packages are considered on a yearly basis (currently EM-3s and EM-4s have access to Peer)
    • Routine mock orals and written board prep sessions are conducted during residency conferences