Quality Improvement Education in Residency Training: A Review

Abstract

Hospitals and healthcare institutions have strong external and internal pressures to improve patient safety and healthcare quality. Quality improvement education has been mandated for resident physicians by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education. This review describes didactic and experiential curricula for residents in quality improvement interventions as well as factors that create challenges to implementing such a curriculum and those that foster it. Resident attitudes, faculty capacity, institutional resources, and dedicated time are critical elements influencing the success of quality improvement curricula. Faculty interest in quality improvement could be enhanced by academic recognition of their work. Recommendations to facilitate publication of quality improvement efforts are described.