title: Toward an ecological perspective of resident teaching clinic.
abstract: Teaching clinic managers struggle to convert performance data into meaningful behavioral change in their trainees, and quality improvement measures in medicine have had modest results. This may be due to several factors including clinical performance being based more on team function than individual action, models of best practice that are over-simplified for real patients with multiple chronic diseases, and local features that influence behavior but are not aligned with core values. Many are looking for a new conceptual structure to guide them. In this paper we briefly review several theories of action from the social and complexity sciences, and synthesize these into a coherent 'ecological perspective'. This perspective focuses on stabilizing features and narrative, which select for behaviors in clinic much like organisms are selected for in an ecosystem. We have found this perspective to be a useful guide for design, measurement, and joint learning in the teaching clinic.
authors.affiliation: VAMC, 500 W. Fort St., Boise, ID 83702, USA. scott.smith2@med.va.gov
authors.forename: C Scott
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.forename: Chris
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Francovich
authors.forename: Magdalena
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Morris
authors.forename: William
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Hill
authors.forename: Francine
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Langlois-Winkle
authors.forename: Randall
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Rupper
authors.forename: Craig
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Roth
authors.forename: Stephanie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Wheeler
authors.forename: Anthony
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Vo