"I Cannot Take This Any More!": Preparing Interns to Identify and Help a Struggling Colleague
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Sondra Zabar1, Kathleen Hanley2, Margaret Horlick2
1Department of Medicine, Division of General Internal Medicine and Clinical Innovation, NYU School of Medicine, 550 First Avenue, New York, NY, 10016, USA. Sondra.Zabar@nyulangone.org.
Background:
Few programs train residents in recognizing and responding to distressed colleagues at risk for suicide.
Aim:
To assess interns' ability to identify a struggling colleague, describe resources, and recognize that physicians can and should help colleagues in trouble.
Setting:
Residency programs at an academic medical center.
Participants:
One hundred forty-five interns.
Program Design:
An OSCE case was designed to give interns practice and feedback on their skills in recognizing a colleague in distress and recommending the appropriate course of action. Embedded in a patient "sign-out" case, standardized health professionals (SHP) portrayed a resident with depressed mood and an underlying drinking problem. The SHP assessed intern skills in assessing symptoms and directing the resident to seek help.
Program Evaluation:
Interns appreciated the opportunity to practice addressing this situation. Debriefing the case led to productive conversations between faculty and residents on available resources. Interns' skills require further development: while 60% of interns asked about their colleague's emotional state, only one-third screened for depression and just under half explored suicidal ideation. Only 32% directed the colleague to specific resources for his depression (higher among those that checked his emotional state, 54%, or screened for depression, 80%).
Discussion:
This OSCE case identified varying intern skill levels for identifying and assessing a struggling colleague while also providing experiential learning and supporting a culture of addressing peer wellness.