Breaking barriers, building faculty: A qualitative analysis to exploring faculty development in academic hospital medicine

Background: Hospital medicine (HM) continues to be primarily composed of junior hospitalists and research has highlighted a paucity of mentors and academic output. Faculty advancement programs have been identified as a means to support junior hospitalists in their career trajectories and to advance the field. The optimal approach to supporting faculty development (FD) efforts is not known. Objective: To understand hospitalist groups' approaches to FD, including efforts that were perceived to be effective, and to identify barriers as well as potential future directions for FD. Design: Rapid qualitative methods were utilized including templated summaries and matrix analysis to identify major themes. Setting and Participants: Virtual focus groups with hospitalists in the Hospital Medicine Reengineering Network (HOMERuN). Main Outcome and Measures: Qualitative themes. Results: Nineteen individuals from 17 unique institutions from across the United States in May 2022 participated in seven focus groups. Four key themes emerged from the study and included (1) academic hospitalist programs face multifaceted challenges and barriers to FD in HM, (2) groups have embraced a diversity of structures and frameworks, (3) due to clinical volumes, FD programs have had to adapt and evolve to meet FD needs, and (4) participants identified multiple areas for improvement, including defining tangible outcomes of FD programs and creating a repository of FD material which can be shared widely.