Faculty Engagement and Productivity During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES

COVID-19 has had an unprecedented effect on faculty of academic family medicine departments. We sought to characterize faculty's self-reported changes in engagement and productivity in clinical, education, and scholarly efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic, and to correlate the changes with age, gender, and level of COVID-19 exposure. We also sought to determine if differences in faculty engagement and productivity were related to departmental efforts to create virtual community, manage conflict, foster engagement with colleagues, and support faculty emotional well-being.

METHODS

We surveyed family medicine department faculty nationally on the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on their engagement and productivity in clinical care, teaching and research, and on the effect of departmental efforts on well-being.

RESULTS

Most respondents reported decreased engagement and productivity across clinical, teaching, and research domains. Older age and male gender were associated with higher clinical engagement. Most respondents were satisfied with their departments' virtual community but reported that social distancing had a negative impact on departmental ability to problem-solve and on personal emotional well-being. Higher engagement and productivity in all three domains of effort (clinical, teaching, and research) were associated with respondents' well-being and with positive perceptions of their department's efforts.

CONCLUSIONS

Clinical, teaching, and research engagement and productivity for academic family physicians decreased during the COVID-19 pandemic. Faculty well-being and departmental interventions lessened the impact of diminished productivity and research engagement.