How to Use

The practice transformation training will provide trainees with the language and principles of the 10+3 Building Blocks of High Performing Primary care, and how these principles can be used to create high functioning teaching clinics. This is the same introductory training that the residents receive. In addition to the 45 minute lecture, we recommend allotting ~2 hours for trainees to complete the Building Blocks Assessment workshop. This will give faculty and preceptors an understanding of the strengths and weaknesses within their clinic and how the practice transformation principles can help improve some of the weaknesses.

Recommended Resources: Practice Transformation Introduction and 10+3 Building Block Assessment

In addition to the practice transformation training, we recommend that faculty and clinic preceptors receive regular boosters on practice transformation. This may include…

• Emailing faculty and preceptors the video series to get a better understanding of each Building Block and how to engage residents in transformation;
• Holding additional trainings on difficult transformation areas for your clinic using the resident curriculum materials;
• Using the practice transformation language regularly in clinic meetings;
• Sending out updates on clinic transformation efforts or resident quality improvement efforts.

Recommended Resources: Preceptor Video Series

Obtaining support from residency program leadership and clinic leadership is crucial for a successful implementation of this faculty development curriculum. With that said, these leaders have many competing priorities which can make obtaining this support a frequent barrier in implementing this curriculum.

For clinic leadership, the day-to-day management of a complicated teaching clinic may make it difficult to set aside time for long term strategic thinking. A faculty champion can help facilitate this kind of thinking and help the team prioritize time for it. When making the case for prioritizing this work, it can be helpful to tie practice transformation to patient outcomes, clinic efficiency or revenue, and staff satisfaction and retention.

For residency leadership, competing curricular demands may make it difficult to prioritize a non-clinical curriculum about practice transformation. A faculty champion can help motivate residency leaders to implement a practice transformation curriculum by explaining its benefits. A strong practice transformation curriculum can help the residency program contribute to improving clinic function and, therefore, the clinical learning experience. Additionally, a strong practice transformation curriculum can help recruit new residents and can help prepare graduating residents for leading practice transformation after graduation.

An understanding of systems structure and systems change is becoming more and more essential to the role of a primary care provider. This may be a new framework for many faculty who were trained primarily on the foundation of obtaining a strong clinical knowledge. A faculty champion can help facilitate a conversation the faculty about the benefit of a practice transformation curriculum to patient outcomes, clinic efficiency, provider burnout, and career prospects for residents. This may be done during a faculty meeting prior to a practice transformation training or as an introduction to the training. If all else fails, just tell them you are training residents so that they can one day build a better EMR...(just don't quote us).

Time is always a perpetual struggle in residency and in clinical settings. Unfortunately, we don’t have a great answer for how to overcome the time constraints of these settings. With that said, some suggestions we have found helpful include:

• Frequent and short training sessions (this is a good use for our video series)
• Integration with existing work (use the language of practice transformation)
• Constant reminders (use clinic meetings or clinic emails to share updates about existing clinic transformation efforts - maybe incorporate some training materials as well)