A Structured, Debate-Style Cardiothoracic Surgery Journal Club for Trainee Acquisition and Application of Seminal Literature

Abstract

Introduction: The acquisition of specialty-specific seminal literature and its application to daily, clinical patient-care decisions are critical components of clinical training. This structured, debate-style cardiothoracic surgery journal club module engages trainees in discussion of realistic patient scenarios, incorporating an extensive body of literature identified as the best evidence for the practice of cardiothoracic surgery. Methods: We designed the structured, debate-style cardiothoracic surgery journal club and delivered it to University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center cardiothoracic surgery trainees. Overall assessment of knowledge acquisition consisted of both direct judging of debates by faculty facilitators and a year-end written test of trainee knowledge. Associated materials include guidelines and resources for faculty facilitators and trainees to prepare them for the journal club debate. Also included are cardiothoracic surgery patient cases, PowerPoint presentation slides, a debate score sheet, and multiple-choice knowledge tests with answer keys. Results: Our structured, debate-style cardiothoracic surgery journal club is an effective educational intervention for cardiothoracic surgical trainees to gain practice in applying specialty-specific, literature-based evidence to particular patient problems. Discussion: This resource may be used by course directors for surgery, for independent study by individuals planning to matriculate into surgical residencies, or as a review for those already in surgical training. Moreover, this curriculum can be delivered at other clinical training programs.

Medical Education Journal Club for the Millennial Resident: An Interactive, No-Prep Approach

“…The JCs were well received; participants indicated having a strong overall learning experience. This approach adds to the literature on innovative JCs by combining interactive techniques 5,[11][12][13][14] with a no-preparation approach, 9,10 both reported in other papers, and assessing not only residents' quantitative assessment of their learning, but their qualitative feedback. This mixed methods approach allows for a better understanding of what JC aspects were helpful to participants.…”

Graduate Subspecialty and Perceptions of Cardiothoracic Surgery Training: A 60-Year Retrospective Study

“…Faculty development to enrich teaching and assessment of technical skills and competence both inside and outside of the operating room [24] can further trainee-tailored education. In addition, augmented with innovative teaching techniques [25,26], these methods can allow for more efficient transfer of information and skills to produce competent CT surgeons to meet the demands of tomorrow.…”

Novel Debate-Style Cardiothoracic Surgery Journal Club: Results of a Pilot Curriculum

“…Faculty had access to the same Internet repository and were aware of the scenarios and debate topics being discussed to maximize faculty participation and attendance. The complete curricular materials used in this study are available in its entirety to program directors through the MedEdPORTAL of the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) [8].…”

“…The pilot journal club consisted of 10 monthly sessions per academic year with five debate topics each for thoracic and adult cardiac surgery [8] (Supplemental Table 1). For each session, two trainees were provided with a specific clinical scenario highlighting an area of controversy with an accompanying position statement and resolution around which the next debate was to be focused.…”

“…One of the perceived barriers of widespread implementation of this curriculum may be concern regarding invested time and effort required from the faculty coordinator. However, given that the complete curricular materials are currently available in their entirety to program directors through the AAMC's MedEdPORTAL [8] as well as through the multi-institutional efforts of the Thoracic Education Cooperative Group (TECoG), the work required to set up this curriculum at a new training program is minimal.…”