Are you graded on patient interaction?

[DAT_MAN]

Do you know if you are graded on patient interaction? I know medicine can be very difficult to explain to someone. I've met some really good doctors who use great anologies and some who are just bland as bland can be.

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[Droopy Snoopy]

It's a component of clinical rotation evaluations, maybe more or less depending on the evaluator and the service. The second step of the USMLE has a clinical knowledge component where part of the grade comes from the standardized patient you're evaluating. Still, now that I know what docs go through I cut the aholes a lot more slack. How nice can anyone be on the bad end of a 36 hour shift? It's enough for me if they find what's wrong and not kill me.

 

[Law2Doc]

Do you know if you are graded on patient interaction? I know medicine can be very difficult to explain to someone. I've met some really good doctors who use great anologies and some who are just bland as bland can be.

Yes.

 

[MystikBliss]

My school and many others have an entire class dedicated to that for the first two years. It's a savior because while all the other classes measure how well you can memorize fact after fact (or rather how long you spend doing so), this class allows your personality to shine through and stresses the importance of patient interactions. For some people it's a breeze, for others...not so much

 

[sponch]

At my school, half of your clerkship grade is subjective stuff like patient interaction, professionalism, motivation to learning, etc., etc.

Basically what happens is that the attendings/residents don't know exactly what any of those things are. So if they like you, you get honors in those check boxes. If you're annoying, you get low pass in those check boxes. I've noticed that if someone likes you, all the parts of the evaluation get shifted toward honors...despite what how things really are.

I've written my H&Ps the same way throughout third year and some people have given me honors and commented on how good they are, while others simply gave me a pass. MS3 is 75% subjective, so don't forget the importance of being nice and pleasant to be around. The other 25% is studying your ass off for the shelf or clerkship exam as that is really the only thing that is completely under your control.

 

[Wizard of Oz]

Let's say I'm doing a ped's rotation. I crouch to a knee and say, "How are you doing little guy?" If the kid just starts crying,

a) am I going to get a bad grade?
b) how do you get the kid to not start crying right away?
c) what do you do when the parent tells you to stop hurting her baby when you haven't even touched the kid?

I can relate to this guy...

Real Med Students of Genius

 

[Bitsy3221]

Let's say I'm doing a ped's rotation. I crouch to a knee and say, "How are you doing little guy?" If the kid just starts crying,

a) am I going to get a bad grade?
b) how do you get the kid to not start crying right away?
c) what do you do when the parent tells you to stop hurting her baby when you haven't even touched the kid?

I can relate to this guy...

Real Med Students of Genius

hilarious!

 

[tomatoattack]

I would say no your aren't really graded on patient interaction. At my school at least you are graded something like this most of the time:

Shelf exam 40%
Evals 40%
Random other crap, like the H&P i need to type and submit right now 10%

The number change a bit depending on the rotation, but note there is no category for patient interaction. Your evals come more from your interactions with your team, and how well you do your job - which is mainly writing notes on the patients and making sure things are getting done.

You generally don't have someone in there watching you do your little morning physical exam and interview, so they don't really know. You could be stone faced with the patient then give your resident a big good morning smile, and the resident will think "what a nice friendly person," even though you may have just walked out on a patient trying to ask you a question.

No one gets bonus points per patient smiles. If you have to round with your surgery team at 6:00 am and you have to see write notes on 5 patients before that time, you don't have a ton of time to explain everything to them, and talk about the weather. Im sure some will disagree, but oh well . . .

 

[bjackrian]

I would say no your aren't really graded on patient interaction. At my school at least you are graded something like this most of the time:

Shelf exam 40%
Evals 40%
Random other crap, like the H&P i need to type and submit right now 10%

I always wondered why I could never get above a 90%!

Sorry, that breakdown looks pretty accurate for my school too.