Advocate Lutheran General Hospital, Park Ridge, IL
Defining and Committing to Physician Professionalism

Abstract

Background: Problems with professionalism are well documented in the literature and are a concern of hospital and GME leadership. Lapses in professional behavior in medical school have been associated with increased rates of malpractice actions during practice. Physician professionalism is essential to achieving safety, quality, and service for every patient every time. Concerns about resident and attending professionalism have been raised at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital (ALGH) but are inconsistently identified and managed, and little has been done to identify exemplars. Our goal was to investigate the literature and to develop an objective definition of physician professionalism for the ALGH clinical learning environment.

Methods: We conducted a literature review to define physician professionalism and used a fishbone diagram to help identify problems. As a result, we created the ALGH Physician Commitment to Professionalism, a document that attending physicians, residents, and fellows sign at application, reappointment, or annual contract.

Results: The literature on this subject is extensive but not always applicable. The Physician Commitment to Professionalism has been well accepted but has not been in place long enough to evaluate its impact.

Conclusions: Defining explicit expectations for physician professionalism is challenging and ongoing work that can and should be undertaken.