A Medical Student Leadership Course Led to Teamwork, Advocacy, and Mindfulness

摘要

Caring for medically vulnerable patients requires physicians to manage complex medical and psychosocial problems, often without adequate resources.1,2 While many medical students begin their training with altruistic intentions to care for underserved populations, few physicians actually do, and if they do, they may not be adequately prepared practically and emotionally.3-5 To build medical students’ capacity to persist in working with underserved groups and experience the sustaining satisfaction of caring for those who need it the most, educators are called to foster resilience through relationship-centered communication skills, mindfulness practices, and self-care.3-13The University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) Program in Medical Education (PRIME) program seeks to increase the number of physicians, advocates, and leaders in medically underserved communities.2 Since its inception in 2007, the UCLA PRIME Program has begun with a 3-week leadership course before the first year of medical school. The content, methods, and evaluation have evolved from a synthesis of relevant theories and input from students, faculty, and a curriculum committee. In this paper, we describe the 2011 version of the curriculum and evaluation.Our curriculum is novel in its emphasis on five relationship-centered leadership competencies: leadership, advocacy, teamwork, mindfulness, and self-care.9-14,17,18,21-24 These derive from the premise that a student’s capacity for leadership and resilience stems from the intrapersonal relationship one has with oneself; interpersonal relationships; and relationships within organizations that build partnership, respect, and change capacity.14 We have also incorporated lessons from other leadership courses.6-8,15,16 We hope this report will generate ideas for medical educators seeking to recruit and retain a physician workforce to care for medically vulnerable populations.Methods