Abstract
1. Identify the value of developing a multiprogram education consortium
2. Illustrate the value of developing a community for peer support and collaboration
Hospice and palliative medicine (HPM) fellowships are small, averaging 2 or 3 fellows per program. The faculty of these fellowships are also limited and frequently part of rapidly growing programs stretched to provide clinical services in their organization. Faculty may be constrained by time and limited in their depth of expertise needed to provide robust education on a diverse range of topics such as pediatrics, specialized technologies (LVAD), or other subspecialities topics related to HPM. These challenges can lead to gaps in HPM fellowship education.
Faculty from five fellowships in a metropolitan area collaborated to create an educational consortium with the goal of addressing the above-identified challenges. A year-long curriculum was developed based on the HPM Certification exam blueprint, including 22 interactive lectures, 2 communication workshops, 4 journal clubs, 4 board question reviews, and 3 wellness activities. Each organization contributed faculty based on each program's areas of expertise. Through collaboration of multiple fellowships, more robust and fruitful discussion were achieved.
Survey data of fellows collected throughout the year assessed the successful implementation of education goals. All 7 fellows were surveyed after each of the 32 education activities. Wellness activities were not surveyed. We reviewed 69 completed surveys for the 2020-2021 curricula. Using a 1-5 Likert scale (1 = poor, 5 = excellent), participants ranked the teaching quality as 4 (7%) or 5 (88%), value of case discussions as 4 (10%) or 5 (86%), and information as practice changing as 4 (7%) or 5 (88%).
By pooling the collective expertise and resources of 5 fellowships, fellows are able to gain access to a strong curriculum and use faculty with broad subspecialty expertise. Fellows developed a community of support and a network of collaboration with their peers and the faculty of the participating organizations.