Dossier n. 174/2009 [Abstract] Tutors for training in the Emilia-Romagna Regional Health Service. Preliminary report

The volume presents the results of the working group of training experts of the Emilia-Romagna Regional Health Service, coordinated by the Regional Health and Social Agency and created to study the training function of tutors, people that dedicate part of their working time to training within services of the Regional Health System.

Some surveys promoted in past years by the Region revealed that tutors’ training activities in Health Trusts were perceived as a widespread phenomenon, with a complex articulation but still little visible notwithstanding the resources used for them.

Moreover, the explicit recognition of training and research functions in the Regional Health Service and the changes introduced in University education, in post-degree training and for continuing medical education determined a new way of considering and organizing education, in which tutors play a fundamental role.

The project

Considered this, the group’s work aimed at the following goals:

• to identify the various typologies of training tutors for health professionals working in Emilia-Romagna Health Trusts;
• to describe specific functions and activities of each typology of tutors meant at guiding and facilitating learning in trainees;
• to estimate the diffusion of the phenomenon.

The Group counted 38 different labels to name tutors.

The report presents the 20 tutor typologies that group the identified labels and a map of tutors in regional Health Trusts, organized on the basis of education level and didactic context:

• University education (degrees in health professions, medicine and surgery, professional qualification, other degrees) and non-University education (training for social and healthcare personnel, high school);
• post-degree training (specialization training, master, specialization schools, specific training in general practice);
• continuing education.

The final section of the volume presents an estimate on the spreading of tutors in Emilia-Romagna Health Service based on data collected in 2007. Up to now only information from a survey coordinated by the Region in 2006 was available; that survey revealed that 20 to 45% professionals dedicate part of their working time to training activities.

The group’s effort to build and share a common system of classification of tutors’ typologies and functions allowed to produce a comparable estimate among the regional Health Trusts, overcoming the different labels and definitions used.

A pre-defined form was used for data collection, with instructions and a synopsis of the different typologies of tutors.

Because of the complexity of the tutorial function, it was not possible to gather all data. However, from the survey an estimate of about 10,000 professionals of Emilia-Romagna Health Trusts are involved in some activities as tutors; the number is probably even higher. The survey highlights also other interesting aspects that need to be studied more deeply; this volume is therefore to be considered as a preliminary report on the phenomenon.