Professionalism & Student Mistreatment

Question 1

What are some examples of mistreatment?

Answer 1

Verbal or physical abuse
Humiliation
Harassment
Intimidation and exploitation
Being ignored

Question 2

What are the most common types of mistreatment?

Answer 2

Publicly belittlement or humiliation 
Sexist remarks or comments
Requests to perform personal services 
Lower evaluations or grades because of gender. 
Racially or ethnically offensive remarks

Question 3

What is power mistreatment?

Answer 3

get my coffee & pick up my dry cleaning

Question 4

What are ranked as the most common sources of mistreatment?

Answer 4

1. clinical faculty in hospital
2. residents
3. nurses

Question 5

What are the reasons that students do not report mistreatment?

Answer 5

Fear of reprisal
Incident did not seem important enough to report
Resolved it on his/her own
For observed behavior, asked not to report by subject of mistreatment

Question 6

What are some things that help students cope w/ mistreatment?

Answer 6

Person and location of Student Affairs Office/Ombudsperson function
Multiple access points known to students to make it easy to voice a concern
Longevity of key administrators
Professionalism training, use of models developed elsewhere or homemade
Explicit discussion of professional behavior by Dean, hospital CEO, in multiple venues
Discussion of interprofessional relationships at start of the clerkship year
Several venues for recognition and reward of exemplary professional behavior
Deliberate involvement of the Dean

Question 7

What are the 3 pillars of institutional culture?

Answer 7

Vision/goals/core values
Leadership/authority (modeled behaviors)
A culture of safety 
--Willingness to report and address:
*Psychological safety
*Trust

Question 8

What is the infrastructure for promoting reliability & professional accountability?

Answer 8

Leadership commitment (will not blink)
Goals, a credo, and supportive policies
Surveillance tools to capture observations/data
Process to guide graduated interventions
Processes for reviewing observations/data
Multi-level professional/leader training
Resources to address unnecessary variation
Resources to help affected staff and patients

Question 9

What is the procedure for dealing w/ mistreatment?

Answer 9

1. informal resolution-discussion b/w student & person involved.
2. discussion w/ clerkship director
3. faculty/resident evaluation process.
4. sexual harassment & discrimination is more formal.
5. associate dean of student affairs & formal stuff
   * **first call to student affairs even if it is informal

Question 10

What can the SPCC do?

Answer 10

additional evaluations
probation
remediation
dismissal