Author: Brian S McGowan, PhD

PURPOSE:
Medical education aims to equip physicians for lifelong learning, an objective supported by the conceptual framework of self-regulated learning (SRL). Learning goals have been used to develop SRL skills in learners across the medical education continuum. This study’s purpose was to elicit residents’ perspectives on learning goal use and to develop explanations suggesting how aspects of the learning environment may facilitate or hinder the meaningful use of learning goals in residency.
METHOD:
Resident focus groups and program director interviews were conducted in 2012-2013, audio-recorded, and transcribed. Programs were selected to maximize diversity of size, geographic location, type of program, and current use of learning goals. Data were analyzed using the constant comparative method associated with grounded theory. Further analysis compared themes frequently occurring together to strengthen the understanding of relationships between the themes. Through iterative discussions, investigators built a grounded theory.
RESULTS:
Ninety-five third-year residents and 12 program directors at 12 pediatric residency programs participated. The analysis identified 21 subthemes grouped into 5 themes: program support, faculty roles, goal characteristics and purposes, resident attributes, and accountability and goal follow-through. Review of relationships between the themes revealed a pyramid of support with program support as the foundation that facilitates the layers above it, leading to goal follow-through.
CONCLUSIONS:
Program support facilitates each step of the SRL process that leads to meaningful use of learning goals in residency. A strong foundation of program support should include attention to aspects of the implicit curriculum as well as the explicit curriculum.

via In Pursuit of Meaningful Use of Learning Goals in Residency: A Qualitative Study of Pediatric Residents. – PubMed – NCBI.

The decision to trust a medical trainee with the critical responsibility to care for a patient is fundamental to clinical training. When carefully and deliberately made, such decisions can serve as significant stimuli for learning and also shape the assessment of trainees. Holding back entrustment decisions too much may hamper the trainee’s development toward unsupervised practice. When carelessly made, however, they jeopardize patient safety. Entrustment decision-making processes, therefore, deserve careful analysis.Members (including the authors) of the International Competency-Based Medical Education Collaborative conducted a content analysis of the entrustment decision-making process in health care training during a two-day summit in September 2013 and subsequently reviewed the pertinent literature to arrive at a description of the critical features of this process, which informs this article.The authors discuss theoretical backgrounds and terminology of trust and entrustment in the clinical workplace. The competency-based movement and the introduction of entrustable professional activities force educators to rethink the grounds for assessment in the workplace. Anticipating a decision to grant autonomy at a designated level of supervision appears to align better with health care practice than do most current assessment practices. The authors distinguish different modes of trust and entrustment decisions and elaborate five categories, each with related factors, that determine when decisions to trust trainees are made: the trainee, supervisor, situation, task, and the relationship between trainee and supervisor. The authors’ aim in this article is to lay a theoretical foundation for a new approach to workplace training and assessment.

via Entrustment Decision Making in Clinical Training. – PubMed – NCBI.

This is a concise overview in a table format for the current membership-based dermatology societies in the USA. The primary objective of these societies is to provide continuous medical education. These societies serve all health care providers in dermatology care, including physician assistants and nurses. There is a clear need for establishing more societies which focus on different aspect of dermatology. There is always a potential for improving the educational activities of these societies.

via Professional dermatology societies in the USA: an overview. – PubMed – NCBI.