SPRING 2013
Published by the Faculty Development Office

Features

• Accentuate the Positive - 'Appreciative inquiry' in pediatric clerkship elucidates professionalism
• Office Visit: Cambodian genocide survivor Seang Seng rebuilds life, leads medical relief missions
• Faculty Rounds: A welcome to new faculty colleagues
• View Point: Claire Pomeroy's legacy of faculty growth and support (by Edward J. Callahan)

'Appreciative inquiry' in pediatric clerkship elucidates professionalism

Third-year UC Davis medical students on a pediatric rotation have been learning far more than clinical protocols and testing their diagnostic skills. Their interactions with proctors are enriching them with inspiring philosophical insights.

"I am only beginning to understand the complexities of medicine, but the twinkle in [my proctor’s] eye and overall love for his patients inspire me to believe that passion for caring for patients will float me above all the difficulties and rockiness ahead. My experience with him helped me understand medicine to be a rocky sea – vast, beautiful and dangerous – in which passion and focus act as a buoyant force,” one third-year student lyrically declared.

Those reflective, optimistic observations were elicited as part of an “appreciative inquiry” (AI) process that faculty colleagues Lavjay Butani and Kathryn Sutter have been applying as co-instructors of record in the Department of Pediatrics’ third-year pediatric clerkship. Butani, professor and chief of pediatric nephrology, has embraced the appreciative inquiry method as an effective means to encourage professional development by building on strengths. The concept is reminiscent of Johnny Mercer and the Pied Pipers’ jubilant 1944 tune “Accentuate the Positive” that advised, “eliminate the negative.”

Butani, in conjunction with then co-instructor, Michele Long, began incorporating AI in the third-year clerkship after reading an article titled “What Students Learn About Professionalism From Faculty Stories: An ‘Appreciative Inquiry’ Approach” by Jennifer L. Quaintance, Ph.D., Louise Arnold, Ph.D., and George S. Thompson, M.D., published in the January 2010 edition of the journal Academic Medicine. Butani and Long took interest because of their impression that medical education exposes students to myriad unprofessional behaviors, disproportionately to positive role modeling.

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April
04  Workshop – The Art of Writing Good Multiple Choice
08  How to Use Multidimensional Mentoring to Ensure Success and Resilience in Research (WIMHS)
11  Breakfast with the Vice Chancellor/Dean
12  How We Decide: The Power of Mental Maps in Decision Making, Part 1 (ECLP/MCLP)
19  How We Decide: The Power of Mental Maps in Decision Making, Part 2 (ECLP/MCLP)
26  How We Decide: The Power of Mental Maps in Decision Making, Part 3 (ECLP/MCLP)

May
03  What Works: An Alternative Strategy to Power, Politics and Personality in the Workplace, Part 1
       (ECLP/MCLP)
10  What Works: An Alternative Strategy to Power, Politics and Personality in the Workplace, Part 2
       (ECLP/MCLP)
17  What Works: An Alternative Strategy to Power, Politics and Personality in the Workplace, Part 3
       (ECLP/MCLP)
23  Managed Care and Clinic Operations: Contracts and Support Services (MCLP)
23  Legal Issues (MCLP)
31  Workshop: How to Give Feedback

June
07  A Leadership Model for Faculty in Academic Medicine (MCLP)

Event co-sponsor
ECLP:   Early Career Leadership Program
MCLP:   Mid-Career Leadership Program
WIMHS:  Women in Medicine and Health Science

Faculty Newsletter is published quarterly.  If you have an interesting topic you would like to see featured in a future issue, please contact Cheryl Busman at (916) 703-9230 or cheryl.busman@ucdmc.ucdavis.edu.