Curēus
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Context Challenges to medical education have been pervasive during the COVID-19 pandemic, and medical students, in particular, have faced numerous obstacles as a result. One of the greatest losses for medical students was the inability to gather with their peers and a lost sense of community. The Learning Community (LC) program at Wayne State University School of Medicine (WSU SoM) expanded our offerings through the use of the Zoom platform to increase a sense of connectedness among medical students. The first initiative of its kind at WSU SoM, the Virtual Conversation series enabled students to share their pandemic challenges while also connecting with physicians on the COVID-19 frontlines. Students were offered eight online sessions with physicians and residents who were able to share insight regarding (1) how to succeed as a medical student on rotation during COVID-19, (2) potential implications of the pandemic on residency applications, (3) the utility of telemedicine, (4) tips for patient encounters, and (5) realities of serving as a physician during a global health crisis. Methods Residents and clinical physicians on the COVID-19 frontlines participated in 40-minute discussions with WSU SoM students through Zoom. ⋯ Results Qualtrics results demonstrated 55% of medical students (n=55) reported they learned new information about the COVID-19 pandemic from the perspective of physicians. Additionally, 62% of medical students described the Virtual Conversation series as 'extremely useful'. Conclusion The Virtual Conversation series emphasizing different medical aspects of COVID-19 provided a unique benefit to medical students' understanding of the current landscape of healthcare, the anticipation of their future roles as physicians, connectedness with their community, and opportunity to practice flexibility as they begin to apply online learning with real-world situations in the health system.
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Background and objectives Infections with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) are rapidly spreading, posing a serious threat to the health of people worldwide, resulting in the World Health Organization officially declaring it a pandemic. There are several biochemical markers linked with predicting the severity of coronavirus disease. This study aims to identify the most effective predictive biomarker such as C-reactive protein (CRP), ferritin, lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), procalcitonin (PCT), and D-dimer, among others, in predicting the clinical outcome of the disease. ⋯ However, the laboratory values of non-surviving patients had shown a lower hemoglobin (p=0.016), increased mean cell volume (p<0.001), significantly increased total leukocyte count (p<0.001), increased urea and creatinine (p<0.001), hypernatremia (p<0.001), increased bicarbonate (p=0.025), elevated D-dimer levels (p=0.043), and elevated PCT (p=0.021) on discharge. Receiver operating characteristic analysis concluded LDH (area under the curve [AUC]: 0.875), D-dimer (AUC: 0.803), and PCT (AUC: 0.769) were superior biomarkers to ferritin (AUC: 0.714) and CRP (AUC: 0.711) in predicting the fatality of COVID-19. Conclusion Inflammatory markers are a useful guide for predicting mortality, and the study results concluded that LDH, PCT, D-dimer, CRP, and ferritin were effective biomarkers.
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Background Using therapeutic hypothermia (TH) reduces the core body temperature of survivors of cardiac arrest to minimize the neurological damage caused by severe hypoxia. The TH protocol is initiated following return of spontaneous circulation (ROSC) in non-responsive patients. Clinical trials examining this technique have shown significant improvement in neurological function among survivors of cardiac arrests. ⋯ After adjusting for age, sex, race, income, the CCI, hospital location, and bed size, mortality was not significantly different between these two groups (p=0.797). We found increased LOS in patients admitted to teaching hospitals (p=0.021). With a p-value of 0.097, there were no differences in total hospitalization charges in both groups. Conclusion There were no significant differences in mortality or total hospitalization charge between patients admitted with cardiac arrest to a teaching hospital and received TH as compared to a non-teaching hospital although patients admitted to teaching hospitals stayed longer.
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Patient-centered care is a core principle of the Canadian healthcare system. In order to facilitate patient-centered care, the documentation of a patient's medical goals and expectations is important, especially in the event of acute decompensation when an informed conversation with the patient may not be possible. The 'Goals of Care Discussion Form (GCF)' at Kingston Health Sciences Centre (KHSC) documents goals of care discussions between patients and healthcare providers. All patients admitted to the Internal Medicine service are expected to have this form completed within 24 hours of admission. Formal measurement of form completion at our center has not previously been done, though anecdotally this form is often incomplete. The purpose of this study is to quantify the rate of completion and assess quality of documentation of the GCF at KHSC. ⋯ The rate of GCF completion at KHSC is noticeably higher than expected based on the previous literature. However, our assessment of the quality of completion indicates that there is room for improvement. Most concerning, discrepancies were found between the 'yes/no CPR' order in a patient's chart and their stated wishes on the GCF. Furthermore, less than two-thirds of completed GCFs were found to have been uploaded to the hospital's EMR. Given the emphasis on patient-centered care in the Canadian healthcare system, our findings suggest that improvement initiatives are needed with respect to documenting goals of care discussions with patients.
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Background Capstone, or bootcamp, courses have been shown to increase the knowledge, skills, and self-efficacy of students prior to starting intern year and have been recommended by the Alliance for Clinical Education (ACE) to be incorporated into the fourth-year medical school curricula. However, a paucity of research exists regarding the exploration of the student perspective on critical curricular content and teaching strategies in a capstone course. Self-efficacy, one's subjective task-specific judgment of capability, has served in the literature as a framework for capstone outcomes and is derived from four sources of experiences: practice, observation of others, feedback, and one's emotional reaction to difficult situations. ⋯ Practical and communication skills with previously limited clerkship exposure and task-specific learning strategies increased the students' self-efficacy. Constructive feedback provided an important source of self-efficacy for all tasks, augmenting the benefits of practice and observation. This data provides preliminary groundwork for future research as multi-institutional studies are necessary to better understand students' needs around the curriculum to address residency transition.