Didactic sessions at the scope

[cneidich]

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Hi all --

I am a MS4 applying to pathology programs.

I was wondering whether residents on this forum could share how much formal teaching rounds (and the quality thereof) your particular program holds at the multi-headed scope. Recently, I had a wonderful experience during an away rotation at a program that held daily teaching sessions at the microscope. For my learning style, I found good teachers at the microscope to be extremely high-yield -- I learned more about basic histology and pathology during those sessions than I would have reading or listening to a powerpoint presentation.

As I finalize the list of programs to which I will apply, I would love to hear about other programs that place a priority on didactic sessions at the microscope.

Many thanks!

 

[DrBloodmoney]

We have a daily conference in the afternoon for a 1/2 hour where the staff and residents bring interesting cases that they are working on and show them. It's pretty great because then you can see most of the good stuff coming through the department, even if you're not on surg path.

 

[Thaitanium]

We have a daily conference in the afternoon for a 1/2 hour where the staff and residents bring interesting cases that they are working on and show them. It's pretty great because then you can see most of the good stuff coming through the department, even if you're not on surg path.

Bloodmoney, which program are you at, if I might ask?

In regards to the OP: yes, I too feel the same way. I learn more if I see a case and it is discussed rather than having to go open up a book. I know you can't be spoonfed everything, but I find teaching at the scope to be precious and effective.

 

[yaah]

Most large programs have this to some extent. In terms of teaching, we have usually a couple of slide sessions every week, sometimes one a day depending on the week, organized based on subspecialty generally. Usually they are unknown conferences. We also have a once weekly afternoon unknown slide conference apart from these, and residents have our own weekly conference where we show each other interesting cases.

 

[Neddy]

My program has daily unknown case conferences on a scope with a projector, usually for an hour (6-10 cases). For the first two months, the first-years have a weekly intro scope session and a weekly grossing tutorial. The only powerpoints we see are at CP conferences, research conferences, and the occasional return-to-body case for autopsy conference.

 

[DarksideAllstar]

To clarify, daily interesting/difficult case conference =/= good scope didactics for residents. In my limited experience at three institutions, usually these require some fund of knowledge to fully understand the diagnostic dilemma (particularly if there are multiple attendings present) and the ability to gather info from a slide that might not otherwise be stated. This would be challenging for any R1 who hasn't had a significant amount of surg path, and I dont know if it would be a good jumping-off point to read about advanced topics (ie subtle non-neoplastic findings that have clinical significance), particularly when you are still trying to figure out the difference between your @ss and a hole in the ground.

I think surg path lecture didactics (ie. power points) serve a purpose, and mainly its to provide you with a base of knowledge to be responsible for in order to be proficient at signing out general surg path cases, recognizing your weaknesses, and finally to review board material. Same goes with hemepath. The remainder of the CP topics at my institution are primarily lecture/problem-based with come morphologic correlation (ie flow conference, then showing the marrow or smear).

I think having "resident-centric" didactic conferences at the scope and didactic lectures are key to a good residency experience, and I would be hesitant to rank any program that didn't have these as part of their training curriculum.

 

[pathstudent]

By definition looking at slides is not didactic teaching. It falls under the "clinical demonstration with patients".

American Heritage Stedman's Medical Dictionary
di·dac·tic (d-dktk)
adj.

Of or relating to medical teaching by lectures or textbooks as distinguished from clinical demonstration with patients.

 

[rirriri]

we have several multi-headed conferences per week. 2 or 3 of them are set up in the schedule as morning conferences. Each day the attendings have a review session of interesting cases where the residents are also welcome to attend and contribute. Then there are some on-the-fly multi-headed reviews which occur all through the day. All in all, plenty of time to sit round a multihead and pick up info...

 

[djmd]

By definition looking at slides is not didactic teaching. It falls under the "clinical demonstration with patients".

American Heritage Stedman's Medical Dictionary
di·dac·tic (d-dktk)
adj.

Of or relating to medical teaching by lectures or textbooks as distinguished from clinical demonstration with patients.

Didactic means designed to specificly to teach or instruct.

didactic [dy‐dak‐tik], instructive; designed to impart information, advice, or some doctrine of morality or philosophy.

So a session that was designed to specifically cover a topic "Neoplastic leasons of the Ovary" would be didactic even if you used a scope to do it.
I would say most people would even include something like an impromptue session like 'hey we just looked at cool DCIS case lets talk about the features of DCIS, and ADH.'

Clinical work of signing out cases would not be didactic..

 

[yaah]

I'd call it didactic if you were looking at slides in a teaching session. Attending shows slides and teaches, that's a kind of lecture. If it was rounds it would be more with clinicians or more patient-centered. Either way, it's kind of semantics anyway and not really relevant what you call it. The terms overlap a lot and to try to distinguish between them is unnecessary for most purposes.