- Joined
- Aug 19, 2002
- Messages
- 1,585
- Reaction score
- 12
The most talented radiologist I ever had the pleasure of working with told me about this study he'd seen...
Participants were stratified by their level of experience in radiographic interpretation. So, experienced radiologists were in one group, young radiologists another, staff physicians in another, medical students, and then I think surgery residents were down there at the bottom.
They took films with known pathology and presented them to the participants; they used some sort of optical tracking to follow the pupillary movement and recorded the times and patterns of what each person focused on.
Medical students would randomly look over the film, without any pattern or purpose.
Staff physicians would look over the film with a repetitive pattern: bones, then soft tissue, then lung windows, etc., finally focusing in on the pathology.
Young radiologists would scan about the entire film quickly, hitting most of the film, then find the pathology and spend the majority of their time on that area.
Experienced radiologists would focus for a long period of time on a midpoint of the film, sort of looking 'past' the picture, then would immediately hone in on pathology. No time was wasted scanning normal areas.
Surgery residents focused on their watches, then the TV set in the corner, then fell asleep.
(JK.)
I thought it was a very cool depiction of the aquisition of skill in interpretation with experience.
Participants were stratified by their level of experience in radiographic interpretation. So, experienced radiologists were in one group, young radiologists another, staff physicians in another, medical students, and then I think surgery residents were down there at the bottom.
They took films with known pathology and presented them to the participants; they used some sort of optical tracking to follow the pupillary movement and recorded the times and patterns of what each person focused on.
Medical students would randomly look over the film, without any pattern or purpose.
Staff physicians would look over the film with a repetitive pattern: bones, then soft tissue, then lung windows, etc., finally focusing in on the pathology.
Young radiologists would scan about the entire film quickly, hitting most of the film, then find the pathology and spend the majority of their time on that area.
Experienced radiologists would focus for a long period of time on a midpoint of the film, sort of looking 'past' the picture, then would immediately hone in on pathology. No time was wasted scanning normal areas.
Surgery residents focused on their watches, then the TV set in the corner, then fell asleep.
(JK.)I thought it was a very cool depiction of the aquisition of skill in interpretation with experience.
