1343 - Outpatient Resident Clinic Quality Improvement: Enhancing Patient Access to Community Resources and Support Groups

Thursday, February 19, 2026

5:00 PM - 6:30 PM AST

Presenting Author(s)

CH

Claudia Hentschel, MD

Resident
Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital/Harvard Medical School
Boston, Massachusetts, United States

Co-Author(s)

JS

Jennifer Su, MD

Resident Physician
Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital
Boston, Massachusetts, United States
TA

Toqa Afifi, MD

Sports Medicine Fellow
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai
New York, New York, United States
WA

Wilma Afunugo, MD

Resident
Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital/Harvard Medical School
Charlestown, Massachusetts, United States
OA

Ofure O. Asikhia, MD

Resident
Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital/Harvard Medical School
Charlestown, Massachusetts, United States
DC

Dylan B. Combs, MD

Resident Physician
Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital/Harvard Medical School
CHARLESTOWN, Massachusetts, United States

Submitter(s)

CH

Claudia Hentschel, MD

Harvard Medical School
Boston, Massachusetts, United States

Objectives: Our goal was to enhance residents’ general physiatry toolbox by expanding resident knowledge of community resources and increase the number of resident clinic visits where residents discussed resources with patients. We aimed to increase discussion of community resources and local support groups with resident clinic patients by 25% within 6 months through one PDSA (Plan-Do-Study-Act) cycle.

Design: Stakeholder feedback was elicited from residents, multi-disciplinary outpatient clinic leadership, community support group hosts, and clinic patients. Potential interventions were identified through the creation of a process map and driver diagram, and evaluated using an impact-effort matrix. Twelve dot phrases were distributed with resources tailored towards common community needs identified for resident clinic patients: information for adaptive sports, book club, aphasia, return to driving, psychology resources and aquatic therapy, and support groups centered around stroke, TBI, SCI, substance use, caregivers, and fibromyalgia. Utilization was measured through resident “referrals” to resources, defined as residents discussing community resources and/or support groups with patients during clinic visits and sharing this information in their clinic note or the patients after visit summary. The number of “referrals” were measured for two pre-intervention months and compared with two post-intervention months.

Results: The most common diagnosis associated with resident clinic visits across all months was stroke. There was a 46% increase in referrals to community resources during the two months post-intervention and a 73% increase in the number of referrals per encounter. This increase was seen across encounters run by residents of all PGY levels.

Conclusions: Informational dot phrases are a low effort, high impact intervention for increasing physician knowledge of community resources and distribution of these resources to patients. Their use may be particularly beneficial for resident physicians who often move to new states and/or cities for training and may be unfamiliar with local resources.