**2. Emotional intelligence in the context of healthcare team structure and function**

In the past, the physician was often viewed as the leader of the healthcare team – directing the care of patients via providing guidance, orders, tests, procedures, and coordinating care with consultants and colleagues. However, more and more the role of a physician, especially in a leadership position, is to facilitate healthcare team integration and operation [12]. The concept of teamwork is a crucial component of being a successful physician (regardless of how defined) [13, 14]. Physicians must now learn how to lead, manage, and navigate a full spectrum of healthcare provider interactions, within diverse teams, ensuring that each team member contributes optimally to the overall care of a given patient.

Medical students are increasingly exposed to this complex environment. The ability to establish appropriate expectations, along with directed educational efforts that prepare one for team-based participation, will become critical within the evolving ME environment. Examples of team-based approaches are many, so we will limit our discussion here to some of the better-known instances. Such well-established team approaches include "Cancer/Tumor Boards", "Cardiovascular Taskforces", and "Critical Care/Intensive Care Unit Teams." In such multi-disciplinary environments, the physician is expected to not only help develop, but also champion, and run – often on a daily basis – such team(s) and recognize the unique value that each participating member contributes. The growing population of nonphysician providers such as Physician Assistants and Advanced Nurse Practitioners is becoming increasingly recognized as valued participants in the health care team. Thus, current medical educational initiatives must provide the foundation for understanding, appreciation, and mutual respect, with a continued focus on professionalism, division of roles, and responsibilities that each team participant brings to the bedside [15, 16].

#### **3. Work-life integration/balance and burnout**

The practice of medicine can be both highly demanding and unforgiving to healthcare providers. Moreover, such demands can be both physical and

*Introductory Chapter: Medical Education at the Crossroads - Things Are Not How They Used to Be… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.104692*

emotional [17, 18]. Healthcare systems are fundamentally and primarily set up to provide services to our patients, and within such a framework it is easy for the individual provider to "forget" about his or her own well-being. Consequently, it is becoming more appreciated that endless work, without the opportunities to step away from the bedside – again, both emotionally and physically – can lead to burn-out and imbalances in work-life integration [19]. The unhealthy consequences on both the physician and the patient are certainly of big concern, and while the topic is far beyond the scope of the current text, the ability to understand, appreciate, and integrate these concepts will be critical to the longterm professional and personal success and fulfillment that a career in medicine brings. Learning appropriate coping techniques and related skills early in one's training can be invaluable, but must also be balanced with the respect for other stakeholders (including work partners, colleagues, various team members, and most importantly – the patients) and hospital administration. The ability to draw boundaries and function within a system that respects such boundaries may be very important "first steps," but the life skills needed to prevent burnout must be viewed as a component of continuing medical education as the techniques and adaptive traits learned early in a medical career might not effectively apply later on, as roles and responsibilities also evolve and change [20, 21].

### **4. Modern didactics: increasing quantity and accretion knowledge**

Without a doubt, the traditional methods of teaching and learning medicine have changed substantially over the past 10–20 years, particularly since the beginning of the digital age [22, 23]. The historical models of a lecture hall filled with students taking notes while listening to a professor, endless reading of papers and textbooks, the hands-on experiences of an anatomy lab, and even the early bedside training experiences have transitioned toward evolving concepts of how to best "teach" and how to best "learn" – including the need for simulation labs, being able to integrate and analyze content from multiple (and sometimes unreliable, inaccurate, or outdated) sources, non-traditional media (i.e. social media platforms, online content, curated videos, computer-based applications, and learning tools) and the endless peer-reviewed, non-peer-reviewed, biased, for-profit, industrysponsored content that is ubiquitously available to all. One emerging term utilized to describe this transformation is "connectivism" – it reflects well the blend of key components of the modern educational information flow ecosystem [23]. A strong foundation established early during the ME process will help the student decide how to use such content and, just as importantly, how not to.
