Medical Student Elective to Improve Diagnosis in Health Care: Developing Solutions to Reduce Patient Harm.

RATIONALE AND OBJECTIVES: At our institution, a new medical student elective was designed and implemented by the department of radiology to teach medical students about diagnostic error. The purpose of this article is to describe the diagnostic error elective structure and implementation, present objective and subjective evaluations of the elective, and provide a model for other radiology departments to run their own electives. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Starting in January 2018, a 2-week in-person career exploration session elective was offered for third year medical students. In 2020 due to the COVID pandemic, the elective was expanded to fourth year medical students. All students were required to complete a project that addressed diagnostic error. Subjective comments were recorded, and objective measurements obtained from student evaluations. RESULTS: A total of 11 sessions were held, consisting of 3 fourth year and 26 third year students. A total of 12 projects (11 groups) were completed, seven of which have been accepted for presentation at national meetings. On a 1 to 5 scale (5 highest), students rated their educational experience at a mean score of 4.61. Subjective comments focused on the benefit of exposure to new topics, mentorship by radiologists, and ability to complete a project in such a short time. CONCLUSION: Diagnostic errors and solutions are vague, new concepts to medical students and even facilitator faculty. This course allowed students to gain awareness of diagnostic error and could easily be replicated at other institutions with interested faculty and medical school support.

Purposeful Remote Radiology Education: Strategies and Recommendations.

The COVID-19 global pandemic has presented new challenges to radiology educators and their learners. As a specialty that is accustomed to adapting to continual technologic innovation, as well as one with the capacity for remote work, radiology is uniquely positioned to meet these challenges by taking advantage of online remote educational strategies. This represents an opportunity to not only leverage new methods and technologies but also reexamine the most effective way to implement established ones. The authors review the benefits of taking a purposeful goal-oriented approach to these challenges, provide a corresponding qreview of the general categories of resources that are currently available, and explore educational strategies by using broad categories of software solutions. An invited commentary by Awan is available online. Online supplemental material is available for this article. ©RSNA, 2021.