Skip to main content

Main menu

  • Home
  • Current Issue
  • Content
    • Current Issue
    • Early Access
    • Multimedia
    • Podcast
    • Collections
    • Past Issues
    • Articles by Subject
    • Articles by Type
    • Supplements
    • Plain Language Summaries
    • Calls for Papers
  • Info for
    • Authors
    • Reviewers
    • Job Seekers
    • Media
  • About
    • Annals of Family Medicine
    • Editorial Staff & Boards
    • Sponsoring Organizations
    • Copyrights & Permissions
    • Announcements
  • Engage
    • Engage
    • e-Letters (Comments)
    • Subscribe
    • Podcast
    • E-mail Alerts
    • Journal Club
    • RSS
    • Annals Forum (Archive)
  • Contact
    • Contact Us
  • Careers

User menu

  • My alerts

Search

  • Advanced search
Annals of Family Medicine
  • My alerts
Annals of Family Medicine

Advanced Search

  • Home
  • Current Issue
  • Content
    • Current Issue
    • Early Access
    • Multimedia
    • Podcast
    • Collections
    • Past Issues
    • Articles by Subject
    • Articles by Type
    • Supplements
    • Plain Language Summaries
    • Calls for Papers
  • Info for
    • Authors
    • Reviewers
    • Job Seekers
    • Media
  • About
    • Annals of Family Medicine
    • Editorial Staff & Boards
    • Sponsoring Organizations
    • Copyrights & Permissions
    • Announcements
  • Engage
    • Engage
    • e-Letters (Comments)
    • Subscribe
    • Podcast
    • E-mail Alerts
    • Journal Club
    • RSS
    • Annals Forum (Archive)
  • Contact
    • Contact Us
  • Careers
  • Follow annalsfm on Twitter
  • Visit annalsfm on Facebook
NewsDepartmentsF

STFM TACKLES PRECEPTOR SHORTAGE

Mary Theobald
The Annals of Family Medicine March 2016, 14 (2) 183-184; DOI: https://doi.org/10.1370/afm.1917
Mary Theobald
Communications and Programs, Society of Teachers of Family Medicine
MBA
Roles: Vice President
  • Find this author on Google Scholar
  • Find this author on PubMed
  • Search for this author on this site
  • Article
  • eLetters
  • Info & Metrics
  • PDF
Loading

Family medicine clerkships are struggling to obtain and retain quality clinical training sites. Contributing factors include time constraints, competition for a limited number of training sites, physician’s concerns about their ability to be effective teachers, physician burnout, and dated practice models that aren’t ideal training sites.1–4

Over the past several years, STFM has developed resources to help community preceptors be more effective teachers and to ensure that students add value to the process of caring for patients. Resources include:

  • White paper: “Strategies to Ensure that Students Add Value in Outpatient Offices”

  • Position statement and preceptor guidelines on student use of electronic health records

  • TeachingPhysician.org: A comprehensive web-based resource that connects medical schools and residency programs to community preceptors. It delivers videos, tips, answers to frequently asked questions, and links to in-depth information on precepting topics to more than 19,000 community preceptors. The site and the monthly communications to preceptors have recently been completely revamped to include:

    • ○ An institution-wide username and password to make it easier for preceptors to access the site

    • ○ Pathways for different users. There are content paths from the home page for resident teachers, new teachers, and preceptors who have a student coming to their office in the immediate future

    • ○ A redesigned monthly e-mail to preceptors that is less promotional and more informational

    • ○ Password-protected institutional hubs where medical schools can share news and upload documents, such as curriculum and student evaluation forms

    • ○ A “rate this content/provide feedback” feature to allow for continuous improvement of content

    • ○ Introductory content that isn’t password-protected to get more people involved in precepting

    • ○ A medical school finder so those interested in precepting can find a school in their area

    • ○ Additional/updated videos and podcasts

    • ○ Increased automation and faster speeds

STFM’s Medical Student Education Committee is hosting a preconference workshop at the STFM Annual Spring Conference, titled “Best Practices for Preceptor Recruitment and Retention.” In this interactive workshop for faculty and community preceptors, participants will (1) identify and address barriers to recruitment and retention of community preceptors, (2) identify motivating factors for community preceptors, (3) describe onboarding/orienting community preceptors in this teaching role, (4) demonstrate how to give feedback to students in an outpatient clinical setting, and (5) discuss the needs of preceptors and health systems with regards to teaching students in the clinical setting.

STFM’s Group on medical student education is conducting national focus groups of community physicians who are or may become preceptors to identify relevant factors in decisions to precept. They will then use lean methodology to rapidly test interventions and innovations to address barriers and create value for community physicians in their role as preceptors. This multi-institutional qualitative study of the preceptors will inform future preceptor recruitment and retention initiatives.

STFM is collaborating with Family Medicine for America’s Health and the other family medicine organizations to address the preceptor shortage more globally. The organizations are discussing the possibility of bringing together a variety of stakeholders for a full-day summit to develop a detailed plan of action to:

  • Reduce the time burden associated with precepting

  • Increase the value of students in community practices

  • Improve the quality of the precepting experience for preceptors and students

Family medicine education cannot succeed without community preceptors to train students in outpatient offices. Recruitment and retention of a sufficient number of preceptors in high-performing practices is going to be a continual challenge given the evolving healthcare environment and the increasing number of medical students and other trainees requiring clinical placements.

  • © 2016 Annals of Family Medicine, Inc.

References

  1. ↵
    Association of American Medical Colleges. Recruiting and maintaining U.S. clinical training sites: joint report of the 2013 multi-discipline clerkship/clinical training site survey. 2014. https://members.aamc.org/eweb/upload/13-225%20WC%20Report%202%20update.pdf/. Accessed Jan 26, 2015.
    1. DeWolfe JA,
    2. Laschinger S,
    3. Perkin C
    . Preceptors’ perspective on recruitment, support, and retention of preceptors. J Nurs Educ. 2010;49(4):198–206.
    OpenUrlCrossRefPubMed
    1. Vath BE,
    2. Schneeweiss R,
    3. Scott CS
    . Volunteer physician faculty and the changing face of medicine. West J Med. 2001;174(4):242–246.
    OpenUrlCrossRefPubMed
  2. ↵
    1. Irby DM
    . Where have all the preceptors gone? Erosion of the volunteer clinical faculty. West J Med. 2001;174(4):246.
    OpenUrlCrossRefPubMed
PreviousNext
Back to top

In this issue

The Annals of Family Medicine: 14 (2)
The Annals of Family Medicine: 14 (2)
Vol. 14, Issue 2
March/April 2016
  • Table of Contents
  • Index by author
  • Back Matter (PDF)
  • Front Matter (PDF)
  • In Brief
Print
Download PDF
Article Alerts
Sign In to Email Alerts with your Email Address
Email Article

Thank you for your interest in spreading the word on Annals of Family Medicine.

NOTE: We only request your email address so that the person you are recommending the page to knows that you wanted them to see it, and that it is not junk mail. We do not capture any email address.

Enter multiple addresses on separate lines or separate them with commas.
STFM TACKLES PRECEPTOR SHORTAGE
(Your Name) has sent you a message from Annals of Family Medicine
(Your Name) thought you would like to see the Annals of Family Medicine web site.
CAPTCHA
This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.
6 + 6 =
Solve this simple math problem and enter the result. E.g. for 1+3, enter 4.
Citation Tools
STFM TACKLES PRECEPTOR SHORTAGE
Mary Theobald
The Annals of Family Medicine Mar 2016, 14 (2) 183-184; DOI: 10.1370/afm.1917

Citation Manager Formats

  • BibTeX
  • Bookends
  • EasyBib
  • EndNote (tagged)
  • EndNote 8 (xml)
  • Medlars
  • Mendeley
  • Papers
  • RefWorks Tagged
  • Ref Manager
  • RIS
  • Zotero
Get Permissions
Share
STFM TACKLES PRECEPTOR SHORTAGE
Mary Theobald
The Annals of Family Medicine Mar 2016, 14 (2) 183-184; DOI: 10.1370/afm.1917
Twitter logo Facebook logo Mendeley logo
  • Tweet Widget
  • Facebook Like
  • Google Plus One

Jump to section

  • Article
    • References
  • eLetters
  • Info & Metrics
  • PDF

Related Articles

  • No related articles found.
  • PubMed
  • Google Scholar

Cited By...

  • No citing articles found.
  • Google Scholar

More in this TOC Section

Departments

  • What do Primary Care Patients Want?
  • STFM Announces New Point of Care Ultrasound Task Force and Initiative on POCUS Family Medicine Education
  • Addressing Research Pathway Gaps: Insights from a Needs Assessment at the AAFP Future Conference
Show more Departments

Family Medicine Updates

  • What do Primary Care Patients Want?
  • STFM Announces New Point of Care Ultrasound Task Force and Initiative on POCUS Family Medicine Education
  • Addressing Research Pathway Gaps: Insights from a Needs Assessment at the AAFP Future Conference
Show more Family Medicine Updates

Similar Articles

Content

  • Current Issue
  • Past Issues
  • Early Access
  • Plain-Language Summaries
  • Multimedia
  • Podcast
  • Articles by Type
  • Articles by Subject
  • Supplements
  • Calls for Papers

Info for

  • Authors
  • Reviewers
  • Job Seekers
  • Media

Engage

  • E-mail Alerts
  • e-Letters (Comments)
  • RSS
  • Journal Club
  • Submit a Manuscript
  • Subscribe
  • Family Medicine Careers

About

  • About Us
  • Editorial Board & Staff
  • Sponsoring Organizations
  • Copyrights & Permissions
  • Contact Us
  • eLetter/Comments Policy

© 2025 Annals of Family Medicine