Description of a Multi-faceted COVID-19 Pandemic Physician Workforce Plan at a Multi-site Academic Health System.

Background: The evolving COVID-19 pandemic has and continues to present a threat to health system capacity. Rapidly expanding an existing acute care physician workforce is critical to pandemic response planning in large urban academic health systems.

Intervention: The Medical Emergency-Pandemic Operations Command (MEOC)-a multi-specialty team of physicians, operational leaders, and support staff within an academic Department of Medicine in Calgary, Canada-partnered with its provincial health system to rapidly develop a comprehensive, scalable pandemic physician workforce plan for non-ventilated inpatients with COVID-19 across multiple hospitals.

A case report of Coccidioides posadasii meningoencephalitis in an immunocompetent host.

Background: Coccidioides spp. are dimorphic fungi endemic to Central America, regions of South America and southwestern USA. Two species cause most human disease: Coccidioides immitis (primarily California isolates) and Coccidioides posadasii.

Stakeholder Groups' Unique Perspectives About the Attending Physician Preceptor Role: A Qualitative Study.

Background: Attending physician preceptors are accountable to many stakeholder groups, yet stakeholders' views about what the preceptor role entails have not been sufficiently considered.

Objective: To explore stakeholder groups' unique perspectives of the preceptor role.

Design: Qualitative study with a constructivist orientation.

Understanding how patients perceive physician wellness and its links to patient care: A qualitative study.

Despite increased interest in physician wellness, little is known about patients' views on the topic. We explore patients' perceptions of physician wellness and how it links to patient care. This exploratory, qualitative study employed semi-structured interviews with a convenience sample of 20 patients from outpatient care settings in a western Canadian city.

How Attending Physician Preceptors Negotiate Their Complex Work Environment: A Collective Ethnography.

Purpose: To generate an empiric, detailed, and updated view of the attending physician preceptor role and its interface with the complex work environment.

Method: In 2013, the authors conducted a modified collective ethnography with observations of internal medicine medical teaching unit preceptors from two university hospitals in Canada. Eleven observers conducted 32 observations (99.

How evidence from observing attending physicians links to a competency-based framework.

Context: Competency-based medical education frameworks are often founded on a combination of existing research, educational principles and expert consensus. Our objective was to examine how components of the attending physician role, as determined by observing preceptors during their real-world work, link to the CanMEDS Physician Competency Framework.

Methods: This is a sub-study of a broader study exploring the role of the attending physician by observing these doctors during their working day.

An orientation to wellness for new faculty of medicine members: meeting a need in faculty development.

Objectives: To evaluate the format, content, and effectiveness of a newly developed orientation to wellness workshop, and to explore participants' overall perceptions.

Methods: This was a mixed methods study. Participants consisted of 47 new faculty of medicine members who attended one of the four workshops held between 2011 and 2013.

How physicians identify with predetermined personalities and links to perceived performance and wellness outcomes: a cross-sectional study.

Background: Certain personalities are ascribed to physicians. This research aims to measure the extent to which physicians identify with three predetermined personalities (workaholic, Type A and control freak) and to explore links to perceptions of professional performance, and wellness outcomes.

Methods: This is a cross-sectional study using a mail-out questionnaire sent to all practicing physicians (2957 eligible, 1178 responses, 40% response rate) in a geographical health region within a western Canadian province.

A real-time locating system observes physician time-motion patterns during walk-rounds: a pilot study.

Background: Walk-rounds, a common component of medical education, usually consist of a combination of teaching outside the patient room as well as in the presence of the patient, known as bedside teaching. The proportion of time dedicated to bedside teaching has been declining despite research demonstrating its benefits. Increasing complexities of patient care and perceived impediments to workflow are cited as reasons for this declining use.

Shifting perceptions: a pre-post study to assess the impact of a senior resident rotation bundle.

Background: Extended duty hours for residents are associated with negative consequences. Strategies to accommodate duty hour restrictions may also have unintended impacts. To eliminate extended duty hours and potentially lessen these impacts, we developed a senior resident rotation bundle that integrates a night float system, educational sessions on sleep hygiene, an electronic handover tool, and a simulation-based medical education curriculum.

A systematic review of evidence-informed practices for patient care rounds in the ICU*.

Objectives: Patient care rounds are a key mechanism by which healthcare providers communicate and make patient care decisions in the ICU but no synthesis of best practices for rounds currently exists. Therefore, we systematically reviewed the evidence for facilitators and barriers to patient care rounds in the ICU.

Data Sources: Search of Medline, Embase, CINAHL, PubMed, and the Cochrane library through September 21, 2012.

Evaluation of a hands-free communication device in an acute care setting: a study of healthcare providers' perceptions of its performance.

Quality medical care hinges on healthcare providers being able to communicate effectively and efficiently. In this study, we examine if healthcare providers' perceptions of the performance of a wireless communication device are consistent with what it is claimed the technology can offer, namely, improved patient safety and quality of care. We used a mixed-methods design where we collected data from a single medical unit.

Hands-free communication technology: a benefit for nursing?

The introduction of mobile communication devices (MCDs) has dramatically altered how nurses communicate. It is critical to assess whether these technologies contribute to stress and complicate the work of the nurse or if the devices are perceived as assisting in the provision of efficient and higher-quality patient care. The authors discuss a study that assessed the perceptions of nurses on a medical unit after MCDs were implemented.

Food for thought: an exploratory study of how physicians experience poor workplace nutrition.

Background: Nutrition is often a casualty of the busy work day for physicians. We aimed to explore physicians' views of their nutrition in the workplace including their perceptions of the impact of inadequate nutrition upon their personal wellness and their professional performance.

Methods: This is a qualitative study of a sample of 20 physicians practicing in a large urban teaching hospital.

The effect of a biofeedback-based stress management tool on physician stress: a randomized controlled clinical trial.

Background: Physicians often experience work-related stress that may lead to personal harm and impaired professional performance. Biofeedback has been used to manage stress in various populations.

Objective: To determine whether a biofeedback-based stress management tool, consisting of rhythmic breathing, actively self-generated positive emotions and a portable biofeedback device, reduces physician stress.

Physician nutrition and cognition during work hours: effect of a nutrition based intervention.

Background: Physicians are often unable to eat and drink properly during their work day. Nutrition has been linked to cognition. We aimed to examine the effect of a nutrition based intervention, that of scheduled nutrition breaks during the work day, upon physician cognition, glucose, and hypoglycemic symptoms.

Not all coping strategies are created equal: a mixed methods study exploring physicians' self reported coping strategies.

Background: Physicians experience workplace stress and draw on different coping strategies. The primary goal of this paper is to use interview data to explore physicians' self reported coping strategies. In addition, questionnaire data is utilized to explore the degree to which the coping strategies are used and are associated with feelings of emotional exhaustion, a key symptom of burnout.

Physician wellness: a missing quality indicator.

When physicians are unwell, the performance of health-care systems can be suboptimum. Physician wellness might not only benefit the individual physician, it could also be vital to the delivery of high-quality health care. We review the work stresses faced by physicians, the barriers to attending to wellness, and the consequences of unwell physicians to the individual and to health-care systems.

Physician well being and quality of patient care: an exploratory study of the missing link.

The goal of this article is to explore physicians' perceptions of their colleagues' awareness of the link between physician wellness and the quality of care they provide to their patients. In addition, we also examine potential factors that may be related to physicians' recognition or lack of recognition of this link. We rely on qualitative interview data from a sample of 42 physicians representing the spectrum of different medical specialties and work settings in a single health region in Western Canada.

On physician well being-you'll get by with a little help from your friends.

This study identifies positive and negative factors associated with physician well being. We collected two sets of data from physicians at a university-based Department of Medicine in Western Canada. First, we conducted exploratory, in-depth interviews with 54 physicians to identify factors associated with their well being.

The generation and gender shifts in medicine: an exploratory survey of internal medicine physicians.

Background: Two striking demographic shifts evident in today's workforce are also apparent in the medical profession. One is the entry of a new generation of physicians, Gen Xers, and the other is the influx of women. Both shifts are argued to have significant implications for recruitment and retention because of assumptions regarding the younger generation's and women's attitudes towards work and patient care.

Association of postoperative complications with hospital costs and length of stay in a tertiary care center.

Background: Postoperative complications are a significant source of morbidity and mortality. There are limited studies, however, assessing the impact of common postoperative complications on health care resource utilization.

Objective: To assess the association of clinically important postoperative complications with total hospital costs and length of stay (LOS) in patients undergoing noncardiac surgery.