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Abstract
Background Medical engagement is linked to improved outcomes for staff and patients including a reduction in staff turnover. There are significant problems with recruitment and retention of doctors globally, it is, therefore, important to try to increase medical engagement within healthcare organisations. This systematic review aimed to review evidence from 2018 to 2023 from peer-reviewed journals on interventions to improve medical engagement and from this generate practical recommendations for healthcare organisations.
Method A search strategy was developed and used across six databases alongside citation searching. Articles were screened to check whether they met the study criteria and were then critically appraised. The interventions were extracted and a thematic analysis, using an inductive approach, was undertaken.
Results 15 articles were found to have met the criteria, however, the studies were generally found to be of low-quality research evidence. The interventions from the articles were grouped into nine themes covering topics such as ‘Improvements to working conditions’, ‘Increasing support to doctors’ and ‘Rewards/incentives/recognition’.
Conclusion The review generated a wide range of interventions which could be used to improve medical engagement, however, critical appraisal revealed that they were of low-quality evidence, so their effectiveness should be interpreted with some caution. The majority of the interventions were transferable to healthcare settings, with some limitations depending on the country. Several HR models were described as options for implementing these interventions within healthcare organisations. Further high-quality research is needed in this area.
- engagement
- medical leadership
- management
- doctor
Data availability statement
Data are available on reasonable request.
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Data availability statement
Data are available on reasonable request.
Footnotes
Contributors JP planned, conducted and wrote up the review for her dissertation project with guidance and feedback from staff at the LSHTM, including her supervisor Nicky Macleod, and a medical librarian from Whittingdon Health. JP amended her dissertation project article to meet the criteria for submission to BMJ Leader, she also used her final project feedback report from the LSHTM to make amendments. She then made further amendments to the article based on feedback from editorial staff at BMJ Leader. JP is acting as the guarantor for this piece of work.
Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.
Competing interests JP used to work for BMJ Quality as their Quality Improvement Lead and editor, 2016–2017. She was also a National Medical Director’s clinical fellow in 2014–2015, the fellowship programme was run the Faculty of Medical Leadership and Management. Both of these organisations are affiliated with BMJ Leader. JP completed this work through the LSHTM’s Public Health Masters course (Health Services Management Stream, Distance Learning). This project was for her dissertation and JP has submitted an amended version of her report to BMJ leader. It was amended to make it more appropriate for an international readership as the original report focused on the NHS in England.
Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.
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