Grants: Medical Education Research Grant Recipients Announced

The Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada's Medical Education Research Grant supports high-quality Canadian research to advance postgraduate medical education and continuing professional development.

Two Centre for Education Research and Innovation researchers have been named among Canada's nine recipients for 2021.

Recipient Lisa Shepherd, MD, FRCRC, MHPE, Professor in the Department of Medicine, Division of Emergency Medicine and Translational Education Researcher at the Centre for Education Research and Innovation in the Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry said, "I was honoured to receive this medical education grant."

Shepherd's research will explore resident responsibility and error and how learners navigate the intersection between them. "Little is known about how residents learn to assume responsibility after errors and how they navigate the complex intersection of individual and system influences. A better understanding of this process may help to bolster residency curricula in patient safety and establish a culture of safety within residency training programs." When reflecting on this grant, Shepherd said, "we have previously studied practicing physicians and medical students and will now be able to add the very important insights from residents."

Recipient Sarah Blissett, MD, FRCPC, MHPE, Assistant Professor, Department of Medicine, Division of Cardiology, and Researcher, Centre for Education Research and Innovation in the Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry said, "this grant represents a huge success in my early career as a medical education researcher."

Blissett's research will explore how trainees select tasks to maximize learning in postgraduate medical education. "The topic of the grant excites me- Postgraduate trainees make decisions about what clinical work to engage in every day. With the implementation of competency-based medical education, their clinical work serves as the launching pad for their learning and their workplace-based assessments" said Blissett. "Although workplace learning environments provide opportunities to select authentic tasks that maximize learning, aspects of these environments may threaten selection of tasks that advance knowledge or skills… We anticipate identifying goals trainees use, the trade-offs trainees balance, and the factors trainees consider when selecting clinical tasks. These data will inform strategies to improve task selection that maximizes learning and fulfills the goals of competency-based medical education."