Psychological aspects of medical care

The mobilisation of professional identity: A scoping and lexical review

“…However, not all were explicitly targeted at professional identity, with nine publications stating a focus on professional identity in either the study aim, or intervention aim [ 75 , 76 , 78 , 82 , 85 – 87 , 91 , 92 ]. The most common intervention was a training or development programme ( n = 11) [ 15 , 73 , 74 , 76 , 78 – 80 , 83 , 86 – 88 ], followed by a change in workplace design ( n = 8) [ 75 , 82 , 89 – 93 ]–these included, for instance, the impact of curriculum development [ 85 ]. Other interventions included a blog of a single teacher, suggesting limited opportunity to generalise from the findings [ 87 ], peer coaching [ 93 ], and participation in a community of practice [ 81 ].…”

“…Other interventions included a blog of a single teacher, suggesting limited opportunity to generalise from the findings [ 87 ], peer coaching [ 93 ], and participation in a community of practice [ 81 ]. Most of the training and development programmes focused on the professionals’ development [ 15 , 73 , 76 , 78 , 79 , 83 , 86 , 91 , 92 ]–for instance, Branch [ 74 ] developed a faculty development programme to promote humanistic professional behaviours among faculty members–namely, physicians. However, two publications were more directly focused on patients via, for example, a patient safety programme [ 80 , 89 ].…”

“…Approaches to assess intervention effect on professional identity varied. Most publications reported on qualitative methods [ 15 , 76 , 78 , 81 , 83 , 86 , 89 , 91 , 92 ], with others using mixed methods [ 75 , 77 , 79 , 80 , 84 , 85 , 87 , 88 ], and the remaining five leaning on quantitative methods [ 73 , 74 , 82 , 90 , 93 ]. Most of the interventions were longitudinal, with much of the data collection using a longitudinal approach to evaluate the impact of the intervention on professional identity [ 73 – 77 , 79 , 82 , 84 – 88 , 93 ].…”

“…Several authors reported the impetus or drive to mobilise professional identity. They raised the challenge of identity conflict [ 15 ], which can be triggered by: a role change–for instance, from clinician to manager [ 76 ]; extending the scope of practice, as demonstrated by incorporating mental healthcare in primary care [ 86 ]; or an intervention, like peer coaching [ 93 ] or workplace changes [ 85 ].…”

“…Two publications suggested this approach can help to flex professional identity by raising awareness of a role; though it was unclear who to [ 80 , 91 ]. Malin and Morrow [ 89 ] stressed the significance of the supervisors’ role to blur roles and boundaries, while Ludden and colleagues [ 86 ] as well as Nichol and Williams [ 92 ] were clear that co-worker interactions had the greatest influence on professional identity.…”