Academic medical faculty and their complex roles

Academic medical centers serve an integral function in society in the training of physicians as well as the safety net provider for numerous patients that otherwise might not have access to healthcare. As resources continue to tighten and funding continues to be scarce, faculty accountability is under increased scrutiny. More specifically academic medical faculty members are feeling the pressure to increase individual production. As academic medical faculties struggle with balancing complex and oftentimes ambiguous roles, the ability to manage and justify resources, the ways academic medical faculty spend their time is increasingly relevant. The purpose of this dissertation was to better understand how academic medical faculties are spending their time and whether or not their time spent on tasks is shifting. This dissertation explored how to better understand the complexities of academic medical faculty members' roles and how these complexities affect local communities at the physician community at large. The study used a quantitative methodology to better understand how academic medical faculty members spend their time. The study compared trends over a recent five-year period (2004-2008) to see if a shift has taken place on academic medical faculties time spent on tasks. The study also followed up with the same physicians that worked at the institution for the same five-year period to compare how their perceptions of time spent on tasks compares with their actual hours worked.