Teaching communication skills: Using Gagne's model as an illustration.

Communication skills is an essential competence for physicians. Good communication skills correlate with higher patient satisfaction and overall patient outcome. Therefore, such training should start as early as in the undergraduate curriculum with experiential methods and more advanced skills to be integrated at different levels. Design of the training program should prepare for the transfer of communication skills into the clinical setting. Supervision from clinician educators could enhance the transfer of communication skills. Faculty development programs could help clinician educators to develop teaching skills needed in teaching communication. Continuous feedback from teachers and reflective practice of the learners are essential for effective learning of communication skills. The design of the teaching should be based on theory such as adult learning theory or experiential learning. Gagne's model provides a template for the systemic design of instructional events, and this article will illustrate an example of teaching communication skills based on the model.

Faculty development program for general medicine in Taiwan: Past, present, and future.

General medical training programs are aimed at promoting competency in general practice skills with a holistic perspective of patient-centered medicine for the new generation of physicians. The faculty development program was implemented to promote learning and application of the six core competencies established by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education. This article describes the implementation and outcome of the current faculty development program. Additional assessment tools of the faculty development program are recommended to evaluate different perspectives of outcome. Our experience suggests that OSTEs are a realistic and well-received approach for faculty development that merits further investigation. According to the clinical instructors' response, our faculty development program effectively increased familiarity with various teaching and assessment skills needed to teach PGY 1 residents and ACGME competencies, and these clinical instructors also then subsequently applied these skills.