Characteristics of quality and patient safety curricula in major teaching hospitals.

The authors recently discovered 2 quality and patient safety curricula for internal medicine and general surgery residents in major teaching hospitals: an infrequent formal curriculum developed by the university and a positive informal curriculum found in the teaching hospital. A hidden curriculum was postulated. These data were gathered through applied qualitative research methodology.

Is there a relationship between high-quality performance in major teaching hospitals and residents' knowledge of quality and patient safety?

Purpose: The relationship of the quality of teaching hospitals' clinical performance to resident education in quality and patient safety is unclear. The authors studied residents' knowledge of these areas in major teaching hospitals with higher- and lower-quality performance rankings. They assessed the presence of formal and informal quality curricula to determine whether programmatic differences exist.

Roles and responsibilities of chief medical officers in member organizations of the Association of American Medical Colleges.

Purpose: To explore the roles of physician leaders who hold titles such as chief medical officer (CMO), vice president for medical affairs, and vice dean for clinical affairs in Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) member organizations, and to identify critical success factors for these positions.

Method: An Internet-based survey was submitted to 340 physician leaders in 281 AAMC member institutions. The survey posed questions regarding demographics, titles, reporting relationships, time commitments, scope of responsibility, accomplishments, and challenges related to recipients' positions, among other questions.

Organizational models for medical school-clinical enterprise relationships.

Changes in the organization, financing, and delivery of health care services have prompted medical school leaders to search for new organizational models for linking medical schools, faculty practice groups, affiliated hospitals, and insurers-models that better meet the contemporary challenges of governance and decision making in academic medicine. However, medical school leaders have relatively little information about the range of organizational models that could be adopted, the extent to which particular organizational models are actually used, the conditions under which different organizational models are appropriate, and the ramifications of different organizational models for the academic mission. In this article, the authors offer a typology of eight organizational models that medical school leaders might use to understand and manage their relationships with physicians, hospitals, and other components of clinical delivery systems needed to support and fulfill the academic mission.