Western Journal of Emergency Medicine: Integrating Emergency Care with Population Health

Learning Objectives: The goal of this project was to promote early professional and clinical development of residents by creating a well-organized, visually-appealing roadmap of co-curricular requirements to augment resident training and provide a well-rounded residency experience.

Background: With the rapid growth of EM as a specialty and an increasing number of accredited residency programs, EM has become increasingly more competitive. EM physician workforce projections are daunting, particularly to current and future trainees. The prospect of securing a desirable and fulfilling job after residency is becoming exceedingly more uncertain, even with fellowship training. While there are evolving larger-scale initiatives to address this, an onus falls on individual trainees and their residency programs to improve resident skillset and marketability.

Curricular Design: Core faculty from various EM subspecialties proposed unique learning experiences within their respective areas of expertise to enhance resident training. Determined by educational benefit, feasibility, and potential impact, the co-curricular requirements were compiled into the Resident Citizenship Passport (Image 1), a visual roadmap organized by subspecialty and class year. This provides EM residents with opportunities to augment their skills as well-rounded EM physicians and educators. It includes elements of experiential learning through concrete learning experiences and encourages learners to reflect on their experiences to create new educational content. Social cognitive learning methods facilitate close interaction with faculty members and staff, leading to early mentorship and timely professional development. A slight modification of requirements was made for senior residents as this was implemented amidst their training. Progress is actively tracked through a google sheet, which residents can continually view.

Impact/Effectiveness: While still in a pilot phase, this innovation has been easily implemented and well-received by the residents, as it lays out the requirements in a centralized, organized, and visually-appealing graphic. This has also unexpectedly incentivized residents to fulfill requirements by inspiring an element of competition amongst one another.