Mentoring Medical Students in Patient Safety and Quality Improvement: Exploring Faculty Confidence and Leadership

Abstract

This study explores how physician mentors experienced their role within a preclinical patient safety and quality improvement (PSQI) project and the impact of mentorship on their professional development. Through qualitative interviews with 11 faculty mentors from diverse specialties, findings revealed that mentoring student-led PSQI projects enhanced mentors’ understanding, confidence, and leadership skills in PSQI. Mentors described shifts in attitudes toward PSQI and increased motivation to lead future initiatives. The results suggest that mentorship not only supports learner development but also serves as an effective faculty development strategy to build PSQI capacity. These findings highlight mentorship as a practical approach to fostering faculty growth and leadership in PSQI and other emerging domains of medical education.

Introduction

Patient safety and quality improvement (PSQI) are increasingly emphasized across the medical education continuum,^1–4 with many undergraduate programs introducing formal curricula early in training.^4–6 We previously described the design and implementation of a preclinical PSQI placement in which medical students engaged in project-based learning supported by physician mentors. ⁷

As PSQI becomes a core expectation for students, many faculty physicians are asked to mentor learners in this domain, despite varying levels of formal PSQI training themselves.^1,8,9 This reflects a broader systems-level challenge: while learners gain structured exposure to PSQI, opportunities for practicing physicians remain limited.^1,10

While mentorship is often viewed as a means of supporting learner development, ¹¹ less attention has been paid to how it fosters faculty growth, particularly in emerging curricular areas like PSQI.^8,12 This short report builds on our earlier work by examining how faculty experienced their role as mentors within a structured preclinical PSQI project and their understanding, confidence, and leadership capacity in this domain.

Methods

Course Overview

The structure and implementation of the preclinical PSQI course have been described previously. ⁷ The course was grounded in project-based learning and centered around physician-mentored PSQI projects. Medical students were organized into teams and matched with a physician mentor from the same clinical specialty. Each team addressed a real-world clinical problem using PSQI methods.

Mentorship Structure

Mentors (n = 33) were oriented to the objectives, structure, and educational philosophy of the course, including core PSQI concepts, mentorship expectations, and the course's emphasis on leadership and student empowerment. Mentors supported learners’ understanding of the clinical context, facilitated connections with key stakeholders (e.g., department administrators, nurses, and allied health professionals), and helped navigate project-related challenges. Faculty brought varying levels of PSQI experience, from minimal exposure to formal training or leadership in the field.

Qualitative Study Design

We conducted a secondary analysis of qualitative data collected from physician mentors who participated in our course. ⁷ All mentors were invited via email to participate in an interview; 11 agreed. Semi-structured interviews, conducted by JLE and BC, explored mentors’ role in the course, perceived successes and challenges, and any influence on their understanding, confidence, and leadership capacity in PSQI.

Audio-recorded interviews were transcribed verbatim and analyzed using a qualitative content analysis approach.^13,14 Two of the authors (AI and HI) generated codes, grouped them under overarching categories, and developed themes. Analysis was conducted using NVivo (v11.4.2) and reviewed collaboratively by AI, HI, and JT to support analytical rigor. This study received approval from the institutional Research Ethics Board.

Results

Interviewed mentors represented diverse clinical specialties, including psychiatry, anesthesia, emergency medicine, family medicine, intensive care, internal medicine, nephrology, pediatrics, and surgery. Six participants identified as male and 5 as female. Mentors shared how guiding student-led PSQI projects increased their confidence and understanding of PSQI while catalyzing professional growth. Many described a shift in their perception of PSQI. Mentors also reflected on developing leadership capacity in facilitating team-based change, coaching through complexity, and engaging stakeholders across interprofessional boundaries.

Mentorship as a Catalyst for Professional Growth in PSQI

Mentors described how working with students deepened their understanding. One noted: “[it helped me] see where I take things for granted… and have that challenged by people encountering it for the first time” (M9). Others gained insight into “challenges that [they] didn’t appreciate before because [they] never formally took on a QI project” (M7), including systemic issues within their programs.

Even mentors with prior PSQI experience reported increased confidence in applying PSQI principles. They valued revisiting the literature and refining their knowledge, noting that each new project uncovered different challenges and learning opportunities: “…any time you do a project and apply the QI principles… you find new challenges, you find new ways” (M6).

Leadership Capacity

Mentors described how the course fostered leadership skills such as problem-solving, facilitation, and adaptive teaching. For example, Mentor 7 described learning “how to approach QI and identify appropriate projects and help the students.” Mentor 10 found working with students to “look at the other side” of situations a “stimulating experience.” While Mentor 9 reflected on learning “how to facilitate and give the team time and room to work and when to intervene.” Mentor 10 also gained experience in how to “manage small teams” and “adapt [their] teaching style” to meet student expectations.

The course further shifted mentors’ attitudes and increased their motivation to lead future PSQI efforts. Mentor 4 shared, “I want to get involved in it more,” and Mentor 3 stated the course “helped to pave a pathway for me to get more involved in the improvement of the health system in the community.” Mentor 7 described wanting to engage in PSQI “out of necessity and out of interest,” while Mentor 4 noted that becoming more confident with PSQI meant they “would be less hesitant to get involved in a QI project” in the future.

Discussion

While initially designed to enhance student PSQI knowledge, ⁷ our course also provided context-specific insights into faculty development (FD) in PSQI leadership. By engaging mentors with diverse levels of PSQI experience and supporting them through expert faculty guidance, mentors reported increased confidence and readiness to lead PSQI initiatives. These findings align with studies that show that co-learning approaches to QI can enhance faculty knowledge and teaching capacity.^15,16 A recent Canadian study similarly suggests that QI mentorship can serve as a continuing professional development, advancing expertise and contributing to broader career growth. ¹⁷ While our findings highlight the value of mentorship, FD alone is insufficient to drive meaningful systems-level change. As others have emphasized, PSQI “educational efforts must expand beyond faculty members and learners to include health system and educational leaders.” ¹⁸

This study has some limitations. Only 11 of 33 mentors participated in interviews, which may introduce response bias. The single-institution setting and reliance on qualitative data may also limit generalizability. While mentors brought varying levels of prior PSQI experience (from minimal exposure to formal training or leadership roles) this was not examined as a comparative analytic dimension, as our focus was on the shared and diverse meanings mentors ascribed to their experiences. Notably, even those with prior PSQI training reported gaining new insights and greater confidence in applying PSQI principles through their mentorship roles, highlighting the program's developmental value across varying levels of expertise. Future research should incorporate objective measures to better assess FD outcomes and compare mentorship with other PSQI educational interventions. ¹⁹

Conclusion

As institutions work to build PSQI capacity across the continuum, mentorship may offer a practical, scalable way to engage faculty in professional growth while supporting future physician leaders.