Journal of surgical education
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Geriatric patients have specific medical and social needs for which surgeons must become adept at caring. In an effort to improve the care of the elderly, we have committed to developing a geriatric component for our surgical curriculum that is part of our PGY2-protected block curriculum. Competencies covered by this curriculum plan include medical knowledge, systems-based practice, professionalism, patient care, practice-based learning, and communication skills. ⋯ The curriculum will be evaluated by assessing participant knowledge through the use of multiple-choice testing. Resident performance on OSVEs will likewise be assessed. This method will allow for assessment of higher decision making and clinical reasoning. Finally, a family meeting OSCE will be used to assess professionalism and communication skills further. Overall, all 6 competencies will be assessed using our specific assessment tools. The curriculum content and instructional delivery will be evaluated using longitudinal and session evaluation forms. RESULTS AND EXPERIENCE TO DATE: The geriatrics curriculum will be implemented fully over 2 years. Three sessions will be introduced during the 1st year, and 2 more will be implemented in the 2nd year. The needs assessment survey results demonstrated a lack of sufficient educational focus on geriatrics topics and a low comfort level in caring for the elderly patient. The 1st session of the curriculum has taken place with positive results. The 1st session was a case-based session that focused on critical care and end-of-life issues in the elderly. Although the medical knowledge data are limited thus far, the average pretest score was 57% compared with the 86% posttest score. The resident evaluations (N = 7) of the session demonstrated an average 4.7 (1-5 Likert scale) for content and a 3.9 (1-4 Likert scale) for instructional delivery. CONCLUSION AND NEXT STEPS: Elderly surgical patients have multiple challenges. Specific geriatric training for surgical trainees is lacking. Over the next 2 years, the curriculum will be developed and evaluated even more for its ability to provide adequate instruction in the specific care of the elderly surgical patient. The ultimate goal is to improve the care of the elderly surgical patient.
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Much is still to be learned about the assessment of simulation-based surgical skills training. However, assessing surgery skills through simulation is a new horizon in medical education. ⋯ Using simulators (both warm and cold) as a means to assess trainees has been established. However, also problems concerning the validity and reliability of such simulation-based assessment tools exist, particularly in surgery, that may need to be investigated even more to decide whether to use them as a tool for assessing the performance of surgical residents.
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Airway management occupies a crucial component of surgical education. As such, it can be difficult to provide adequate training within the hospital setting alone. To be facile in all aspects of nonsurgical airway management, the surgical resident must have thorough cognitive understanding of the process as well as technical mastery. The Department of Surgery at the Methodist Hospital in Houston has developed a curriculum for nonsurgical airway management that uses multiple modalities for education, reinforcement, and testing. Didactic lectures based on established national guidelines are provided as a foundation. This method is supplemented by hands-on group scenarios that use inanimate models. Throughout the course, faculty leaders provide guidance and skills assessment. Residents are tested for competency using core value checklists based on knowledge and technical proficiency. During its pilot year, the curriculum has proven its need and success in residency education. Future improvements include development of specific clinical scenarios as well as integration of more advanced educational equipment and models for use in nonsurgical airway management. ⋯ Our preliminary experience with a nonsurgical airway management training module for surgical residents has shown that a need for training exists in this critical area. Correct procedural adoption occurred rapidly after a didactic and procedural hands-on experience. Time intervals needed for review to maintain competence will also be studied. Improvements to the proficiency criteria and simulations are underway.
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The scope of patient management increasingly crosses the defined lines of multiple medical specialties and services to meet patient needs. Concurrently, many hospitals and health-care systems have adapted new multidisciplinary team structures that provide patient-centric care as opposed to the more traditional discipline-centered delivery of care. As health care continues to evolve, the use of teams becomes even more critical in allowing interdependence between multiple disciplines to provide excellent care delivery and ongoing patient management. ⋯ Most importantly, we wish to emphasize that health care, both philosophically and practically, is delivered best through high-performance teams. For such teams to perform properly, the organizational environment must support the team concept tangibly. In concert, we believe the best manner in which to cultivate knowledge and performance of the health-care organizational mission and goals is by using such teams.