Journal of surgical education
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Comparative Study
Four-year experience with a regional program providing simulation-based endovascular training for vascular surgery fellows.
High-fidelity procedure simulation has been found useful for training vascular surgery residents in endovascular procedures, but the costs of acquiring, maintaining, and operating simulators represent a barrier to routine use of endovascular simulation in vascular surgery programs. Providing simulation training opportunities through regional centers may make simulation more cost effective, but the costs and benefits of this approach have not been reported previously. We reviewed participation costs in a regional simulation program to provide a benchmark for comparison with other training options. ⋯ Vascular surgery fellows' participation in simulation training at regional centers offers program directors a lower cost alternative for providing high-fidelity simulation training, compared with acquiring and operating an endovascular procedure simulator at their individual institutions.
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Comparative Study
Factors correlated with surgery resident choice to practice general surgery in a rural area.
General surgery workforce shortages in the rural United States are likely to worsen over the next decade. We sought to identify reasons that general surgery residency graduates choose rural versus urban practice. ⋯ General surgery residency graduates and their spouses who choose rural practices are more likely than those selecting urban practices to have rural backgrounds and interests. Completing a rural clerkship during medical school and choosing a residency program committed to rural general surgery preparation are strongly correlated with rural practice. These findings may help formulate strategies to increase recruitment and retention of rural general surgeons.
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Recently, the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) has developed and enforced a complex set of regulations limiting resident duty hours (RDHs). One potential method to comply with these stringent regulations and better document resident work hours would be to use text message (TM)/short message service (SMS), allowing rapid, inexpensive, and interactive 2-way delivery of information. The purpose of this study was to document the successful implementation of TM to enhance compliance with the ACGME RDH regulations. ⋯ We were able to implement successfully a novel technique for ACGME RDH documentation and compliance in a general surgery residency program through the use of TM; this approach employed a state-of-the-art time-tracking method that was associated with high levels of resident work-hour compliance and overall satisfaction.
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Comparative Study
Visual learning: harnessing images to educate residents optimally.
Surgical educators are confronted with outdated models of education and less time for teaching. Digital images present an opportunity for a new method of education. ⋯ By incorporating surgical images into the teaching process, the teacher enhances insight and learning. In addition, by prompting the students to add creative elements to the thought process for diagnosis and management, the teaching format can be a dynamic and interactive process.
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A fundamental premise of establishing collaborative relationships between residents and nurses is a basic understanding of the attributes of each group. The intent of this study was to determine what surgical nurses know about surgical residents. ⋯ Despite the importance of the collaborative relationship in surgical patient care, surgical nurses have a limited understanding of surgical residents. Educating nurses about the education, roles, and responsibilities of surgical residents might improve collaborative relationships and ultimately patient care.