Entrustable Professional Activities

The EPAs are clinical tasks that are observable and measurable in clinical settings. EPAs will be introduced in first and second years in the Longitudinal Family Medicinehalf-day clinical experiences and the Patient Centered Clinical Methods course.

The year-long Clerkship course will properly incorporate the EPAs into all of the required rotations. For ease of faculty training and development, there will be similarities with the scale being used in the Royal College CBD programs. Currently, a pilot of the assessment tool in Elentra is being developed and will be underway shortly in two of the core rotations.

Upon graduation, all Schulich Medicinestudentswill be “entrustable with indirect supervision” on each one of the 12 core clinical tasks of physicians. Entrustability with the 12 EPAs is essential for quality patient care while ensuring successful transitions for our graduates moving onto the next stage of learning–our postgraduate medical education programs are moving or have moved to competency-based models.

The twelve AFMC EPAs for an MD Program are:

  1. Obtain a history and perform a physical examination adapted to the patient’s clinical situation
  2. Formulate and justify a prioritized differential diagnosis
  3. Formulate an initial plan of investigation based on the diagnostic hypotheses
  4. Interpret and communicate results of common diagnostic and screening tests
  5. Formulate, communicate and implement management plans
  6. Present oral and written reports that document a clinical encounter
  7. Provide and receive the handover in transitions of care
  8. Recognize a patient requiring urgent or emergent care, provide initial management and seek help
  9. Communicate in difficult situations
  10. Participate in health quality improvement initiatives
  11. Perform general procedures of a physician
  12. Educate patients on disease management, health promotion and preventive medicine