Educational Relative Value Units as a Measure of Academic Productivity: A Systematic Review

Academic Health Centers (AHCs) have complex, often competing missions. Many have developed mission-based management (MBM) systems to support their clinical and non-clinical missions. There are limited data on MBM use for their educational missions. Our scoping review explored how AHCs employed such systems.  Materials and methods: Arksey and O'Malley's six-stage framework guided our review. Based on pre-defined criteria, English language articles from PubMed, EMBASE, SCOPUS, and the Healthcare Administration Database published between 2010 and 2020 were loaded into a reference manager. The search included all health professions education schools. Articles were excluded if they were review articles, commentaries, or clearly did not involve funding for education. From the final list of selected articles, data were extracted using a data extraction sheet we developed. Two researchers reviewed each article again to ensure extracted data were reported consistently and with sufficient detail.  Results: Of the 1729 manuscripts identified, 35 met inclusion criteria. Sixteen (46%) contained data in some form but did not have a formal methods section describing the specific approach to data collection and analysis. Moreover, there was marked variability in how educational effort was quantified, what counted as educational effort (educational scholarship versus teaching) and the impacts of such quantification (departmental funding versus individual faculty incentives). None of the studies reported on the impact on faculty promotion. Faculty satisfaction with the system was reported in seven studies (20%) and was generally positive.

A systematic description of how systems were developed to support the educational mission was lacking. Clear goals, methods of development, uniform data on educational productivity and quality, and program evaluation were not defined by most articles. This lack of process clarity presents a challenge, but more importantly an opportunity for academic health centers to unify efforts and continue to further their educational mission.