"Bingo!”, called out a grinning participant in the middle of my complex information-heavy lecture on diabetic ketoacidosis. My audience had been competing to fill in answers to questions on bingo-sheets as we discussed them in the session. Not only did it force my learners to pay attention, it also made my talk fun- and memorable. “You have the best ideas!”, a colleague exclaimed. The truth, though, is that the idea isn’t mine at all. Concept mapping is only one of the many incredible strategies we had learned about recently in the Health Professional Education (HPE) certificate course- I had just been trying it out.

I hadn’t really known what to expect when I enrolled. As a trainee, I had always had a deep appreciation for mentors and teachers who took the time to invest in me and helped shape my career. Now, as an early-career faculty member, I suddenly found myself on the other side of the learning equation. I was rearing with enthusiasm to ‘pass it forward’ and share my passion for endocrinology with the next generation of learners. I had been striving to incorporate teaching wherever I could with my observers and trainees, but often wondered if I was getting through to them. Was I saying the right things? Was I doing enough? Was I “dumbing” things down too much for my intelligent learners or was I developing a tendency to assume that they understood- even when they had no idea what I was talking about? This was when I saw Staci Saner’s email describing the Instructional Strategies in HPE course. It sounded fun, low-commitment and had the potential to help me find the answers that I was looking for. On a whim, I replied back, heard back promptly, and soon I was sitting in class at 6 pm on a Monday, learning about a whole new world of possibilities.

When you choose to become a physician, everyone knows that you are taking on a life of eternal learning. As we go through years of rigorous training, we realize that we learn best by teaching. “See one, do one, teach one”, is our mantra by default. In fact, the word ‘doctor’ is derived from the Latin, docco, which means ‘to teach’. Whether it is academic medicine with formalized lectures, bedside resident teaching, or education of a family about the patient’s new diagnosis- all doctors teach- and enjoy teaching. However, for most of us, it is just something that occurs if there is time/energy left after patient-care. In this RVU-driven high-pressure healthcare business model, as we struggle to prioritize and prevent burnout, our innate romanticism reassures us that we still make a difference. So, on the first day of HPE class, when Dr. Rabalais asked us what we thought the most important aspect of our job was, my mind automatically wandered to clinic, and I proudly recounted how I had been able to initiate a rarely-used but life-changing treatment for a complicated patient that day.

So, I helped that one patient? Yes. Did I have a learner working with me? Yes. What if the same learner sees five similar patients in their career, and directly chooses the right therapeutic because of what they had learned in the clinic with me today? What if that one learner teaches three other learners? What if he/she develops an interest in the condition and goes on to develop a brand-new modality for the same? How many patients would I have helped then? In our clinical role, we treat patients one at a time. But when we train a future provider, we create a ripple effect of improved health-care across generations. The profundity of the following statement has motivated me ever since: the greatest impact that one can have as a physician is by being a powerful and effective educator.

My job title is ‘clinician-educator’. I have been trained well to be an astute ‘clinician’- a plethora of books, lectures, articles and research materials have helped me develop expertise on conditions I manage routinely. When it comes to the ‘educator’ part of my job though, my only resource thus far had been memories of good and bad teaching sessions I have encountered along the way. With the HPE certificate courses, I get to further invest in developing my skills as an educator. With each class I attend, I amazed by how much information there is about all of this material. There are so many big and little strategies we can use as educators to ensure that we are promoting active, useful and retentive learning. These have been studied and proven over time. I now realize that most of us tend to teach like we were taught as children in school while dispensing education to motivated adults is a completely different ball game. A year ago, my preparation for a lecture would have involved cramming three hours of information into one hour, rushing through each slide, with funny cartoons interspersed to make my PowerPoint seem accessible. Today, it starts with me developing 2-3 ‘SMART’ learning objectives and then developing evidence-based learning and assessment activities to achieve them. I worry less about how much I cover while teaching, and I focus more on how my learner is using the information. I still struggle a lot- but I am starting to recognize areas of improvement, and I am learning to work on them. So this season of giving thanks, I am thankful for the brand new insight that I have been gaining on the science and art of effective medical education.

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Would you like more information about the Health Professions Education Certificate program? See the information on the Faculty Development website or email HPE@louisville.edu