Military medicine
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The teaching and assessment of clinical skills are critical components of health care provider education, and clinical skill proficiency is essential for safe and successful health care delivery. Medical simulation is being increasingly recognized in health care education as an extremely valuable mechanism for training and assessing clinical skills. As in other high-stakes professions, the use of simulation can enhance the proficiency and efficiency of training while maximizing safety and minimizing risk. ⋯ Results showed that the primary users were graduate medical education physicians-in-training. In addition, survey results demonstrated that users favored simulation-based learning because of the realism of simulated scenarios. The Trauma Simulation Training Center embraces the simulation-based medical education philosophy by actively inviting training program participation, and we realize that more research is needed to determine the effectiveness of this teaching and assessment modality.
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Among U.S. Vietnam War veterans, we assessed whether preinduction cognitive abilities were associated with the risk of developing combat-related post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). ⋯ We found significant interactions between preinduction cognitive abilities and severity of combat exposure for the lifetime diagnosis of combat-related PTSD among Army Vietnam War veterans. High levels of combat exposure are likely to exhaust intellectual resources available for coping with stressful life events. Lower scores for cognitive abilities are not uniformly disadvantageous, and this should be considered by military manpower policymakers.
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As the veteran population becomes ethnically diverse, it is important to understand complex interrelationships between racism and health. This study examined the association between perceptions of discrimination and self-reported mental and physical health for Asian/Pacific Islander, African American, and Hispanic veterans. The data for this study come from the 2001 Veteran Identity Program Survey, which measured utilization of outpatient care, discrimination, and health status across three minority veteran groups. ⋯ Findings revealed that racial/ethnic discrimination during military service was significantly associated with lower physical, but not mental health. Satisfaction with health care provider's sensitivity toward racial/ethnic background was significantly associated with better mental health. Findings highlight the importance of developing policies that address racial/ethnic discrimination during military service while providing health care services for veterans.