Academic medicine : journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges
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Randomized Controlled Trial Comparative Study Clinical Trial
A prospective randomized trial of a residents-as-teachers training program.
To develop, implement, and evaluate a course for improving the teaching skills of surgery residents. ⋯ This study demonstrates the value of a needs assessment in developing a course to improve residents' teaching skills. Such courses must provide active learning with opportunities for practicing skills and, following the course, ongoing feedback to maintain changes in teaching behaviors. The curriculum developed in this study has been put into a transportable form that includes an instructor's manual providing guidelines and suggestions for implementation.
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To evaluate the effect that increased numbers of women medical school graduates have had on the composition of orthopedic surgery residencies, and to evaluate trends over time in the likelihood of women medical students to select orthopedic residencies. ⋯ Orthopedics remains an unattractive career choice for women medical students compared with their men counterparts. Biases and stereotypes about women and about orthopedic surgery may account for this difference.
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To determine whether applicants to pediatrics residency and fellowship programs misrepresented authorship of publications. ⋯ Misrepresentation occurs on graduate medical education applications; solutions are needed to address this problem.
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Review
Strategies for improving teaching practices: a comprehensive approach to faculty development.
Medical school faculty members are being asked to assume new academic duties for which they have received no formal training. These include time-efficient ambulatory care teaching, case-based tutorials, and new computer-based instructional programs. In order to succeed at these new teaching tasks, faculty development is essential. ⋯ Research on these strategies suggests that workshops and students' ratings of instruction, coupled with consultation and intensive fellowships, are effective strategies for changing teachers' actions. A comprehensive faculty development program should be built upon (1) professional development (new faculty members should be oriented to the university and to their various faculty roles); (2) instructional development (all faculty members should have access to teaching-improvement workshops, peer coaching, mentoring, and/or consultations); (3) leadership development (academic programs depend upon effective leaders and well-designed curricula; these leaders should develop the skills of scholarship to effectively evaluate and advance medical education); (4) organizational development (empowering faculty members to excel in their roles as educators requires organizational policies and procedures that encourage and reward teaching and continual learning). Comprehensive faculty development, which is more important today than ever before, empowers faculty members to excel as educators and to create vibrant academic communities that value teaching and learning.