Connecting with GME: Building on previous efforts, structuring outreach, and increasing engagement with Graduate Medical Education

Abstract

Background: After intermittent outreach to Graduate Medical Education (GME) residents, fellows, and faculty, a medical school library assigned one librarian to be the liaison to GME. After designating a GME liaison, engagement with GME students and departments improved with increased numbers of orientations. Further outreach approaches were diversified and designed to meet the needs of students, staff and faculty. An MLA 2020 poster highlighted the lack of literature about GME liaison librarians and their experiences. This paper provides a variety of ideas for librarians who want to connect with GME stakeholders in a medical school. Description: Previous outreach to the GME consisted of tabling during general new resident orientations, email offers for library orientations sent to resident coordinators, and regular search consultations provided to two departments' residents who lead journal clubs. To increase contact, the liaison librarian expanded previous efforts by designing a robust multipronged outreach approach, including: scheduling earlier communication to GME departments, providing updated lists of contacts to departmental liaisons, collecting and sharing GME news and information with other liaisons, reaching out to newly-established residencies across the state, working with colleagues to develop a scholarly publishing research guide, establishing a regular class with Family Medicine residents, and implementing assessment of resident library orientations. When GME general orientations were held online during the pandemic, a Zoom room was created and an interactive handout was developed. Interaction was incentivized with "swag bags" sent through campus mail. Conclusions: In 2018, seven sessions with new residents were provided after twenty-seven emails to 27 GME departments were sent in June. After tracking email timing 2018-2020, the GME liaison determined that communication sent March-April before residents arrive in June received the most responses from resident coordinators. In 2021, GME departmental information and tracking sheets were reorganized to better match liaison departmental areas. Forty GME departments were contacted via 48 individualized emails (including follow-up emails to non-responders), and 16 library orientations were scheduled for new residents and fellows. During the pandemic, more than thirty-seven residents and fellows attended the library's general orientation Zoom room in 2020. Twenty-nine residents and fellows interacted with the library's ORCiD handout in 2021. Additional GME initiatives since 2019 include: a Scholarly Publishing Research Guide, a Family Medicine Scholarship Rotation instruction, and GME Scholarship tracking projects.