The Integrating Medicine, Purpose, and Action through Collaborative Thinking (I.M.P.A.C.T.) Leadership Track is a two-year extra-curricular learning track offered through the University of Connecticut Graduate Medical Education Office. Learners will develop cross-continuum competencies that promote professional development through examination of scholarship regarding the connections between diversity and inclusion with quality, safety, wellness, and performance in the provision of mission-driven health care.

The principle aim of the IMPACT Leadership Track is to engages a multi-specialty cohort of trainees and faculty in a learning community that supports examination and pursuit of career pathways focused on leadership in medicine.

An additional aim of the curriculum is to enhance the resources at the University of Connecticut and affiliated teaching hospitals that support medical education and scholarship focused on health equity, population health management, and systems-based practice in medicine.

Interested trainees from any University of Connecticut post-graduate training program in the PGY2 year or beyond are encouraged top apply. Post-graduate year one trainees may be considered on a selected basis.

Integrating Medicine, Purpose, and Action through Collaborative Thinking (I.M.P.A.C.T.) Leadership Track

Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) is a value system that embraces accountability for holistic evaluation and promotion of equity and inclusion in opportunities for professional development. In the healthcare industry, DEI competencies can also create value by enhancing the abilities of healthcare institutions to promote systems-based practice, increase the effectiveness of multi-specialty health care coordination, address the needs of vulnerable patient communities, and improve healthcare treatment and outcomes for all.

The American College of Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) recommends that post-graduate medical training address diversity, equity, and inclusion and related subjects such as health care disparities, patient-centered care, implicit bias, structural bias, social influencers of health, harassment, allyship, and anti-discrimination. Although these curricula are now more widespread, we believe that a pedagogical focus on health care disparities and resources that support delivery of health care to vulnerable patient communities may be complemented by curricula that develops DEI as a strategic competency that may enhance the capabilities of post-graduate medical trainees to pursue career pathways as leaders in medicine.

The University of Connecticut Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Leadership Track is a 2-year, multi-disciplinary curriculum. A monthly didactic program is designed with a framework: Awareness, Reflection, Empowerment, Action (A.R.E.A.). The Awareness, Empowerment, and Action modules incorporate monthly in-person seminars supplemented with on-line, self-paced learning programs selected from the ACGME Equity Matters. The monthly curriculum profiles leaders from the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, its affiliated health centers, and leaders in healthcare from across the United States.

The curriculum begins by defining areas of scholarship that are related to DEI and the practice of medicine, it progresses by assisting learners to develop tools for addressing topics related to DEI and population health, and the curriculum concludes with presentation of leadership pathways connected with DEI that include, but are not limited to, academia, volunteerism, global health, philanthropy, hospital administration, public policy, legislative advocacy, organized medicine, and private industry research.

Reflection exercises are incorporated through discussions groups, self-paced learning with selected ACGME Health Equity Matters videos, and book clubs. Trainees will interact with leaders in healthcare through visiting professor lectures and through a DEI Leaders in Healthcare Webinar Series. Trainees will also receive support to perform quality improvement, advocacy, education, or community engagement initiatives that they may share at the conclusion of the course during a graduation ceremony.

The IMPACT Leadership Track supports post-graduate medical trainees to evaluate career pathways as future leaders in medicine through examination of their value systems, identities, and lived experiences. The curriculum aims to engage learners and faculty in a multi-specialty and inter-disciplinary community of scholars who seek to advance efforts to understand and address mutable health care treatment and outcome disparities while also examining and advancing the connections between diversity and inclusion with professional development, organizational leadership, and mission-driven healthcare.

Post-graduate year two (PGY2) trainees or beyond will be the focus for enrollment. PGY1 learners may be enrolled on a selected basis.

Interested post-graduate trainees are encouraged to submit an application. Approximately 10 trainees will be invited to participate in the IMPACT Leadership Track each year. This is an extra-curricular learning track with endorsement from University of Connecticut Graduate Medical Education.

IMPACT Leadership Track Application