Journal of surgical education
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To introduce 3 novel intensive facial plastic and reconstructive surgery teaching modules for surgical capacity building using simulation in a low-middle income country. ⋯ Implementation of an intensive surgical training module combining didactics, surgical simulation, and live surgery resulted in the successful transfer of both skills and knowledge. While the long-term benefit of this program is yet to be determined, this model of training may prove to be a useful tool to help address surgical capacity building in the developing world.
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In response to our faculty's concerns about the quality and reliability of feedback from general surgery residents, we developed a novel faculty assessment tool. This study was designed as an interim analysis of the tool's effectiveness and discriminatory ability. ⋯ This milestone-based faculty assessment tool improves the quality of the feedback from surgical residents when evaluating faculty. When residents assign a negative statement to describe faculty educational effectiveness in a specific domain, performance improves. A milestone-based faculty assessment strategy should be explored on a national level.
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Comparative Study
Can Deficiencies in Performance Be Identified Earlier in Surgical Residency? An Initial Report of a Surgical Trainee Assessment of Readiness Exam.
Identifying gaps in medical knowledge, patient management, and procedural competence is difficult early in surgical residency. We designed and implemented an end-of-year examination for our postgraduate year 1 residents, entitled Surgical Trainee Assessment of Readiness (STAR). Our objective in this study was to determine whether STAR scores correlated with other available indicators of resident performance, such as the American Board of Surgery in-training exam (ABSITE) and Milestone scores, and if they provided evidence of additional discriminatory value. ⋯ We have created a multifaceted standardized STAR exam, which correlates with performance on the ABSITE and early milestone scores. It also appears to discriminate resident performance where milestone assessments do not. Further evaluation of the STAR exam with longer term follow-up is needed to confirm these initial findings.
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Comparative Study
Examining the Impact of Using the SIMPL Application on Feedback in Surgical Education.
The System for Improving and Measuring Procedural Learning (SIMPL) smartphone application allows physicians to provide dictated feedback to surgical residents. The impact of this novel feedback medium on the quality of feedback is unknown. Our objective was to compare the delivery and quality of best-case operative performance feedback given via SIMPL to feedback given in-person. ⋯ Although feedback given via SIMPL was more direct and based on the attendings' perspectives, the quality of the feedback did not differ significantly. Use of the dictation feature of SIMPL to deliver resident operative performance feedback is a reasonable alternative to in-person feedback.
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Trauma patients are triaged by the severity of their injury or need for intervention while en route to the trauma center according to trauma activation protocols that are institution specific. Significant research has been aimed at improving these protocols in order to optimize patient outcomes while striving for efficiency in care. However, it is known that patients are often undertriaged or overtriaged because protocol adherence remains imperfect. The goal of this quality improvement (QI) project was to improve this adherence, and thereby reduce the triage error. It was conducted as part of the formal undergraduate medical education curriculum at this institution. ⋯ The combination of web tool implementation and protocol refinement decreased the combined triage error rate by over 50% (from 16.7%-7.9%). We developed and tested a web tool that improved triage accuracy, and provided a sustainable method to enact future quality improvement. This web tool and QI framework would be easily expandable to other hospitals.