The Florida Clinical Skills Collaborative: A New Regional Consortium for the Assessment of Clinical Skills.

Discontinuation of the United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) Step 2 Clinical Skills (CS) exam and Comprehensive Osteopathic Medical Licensing Examination (COMLEX) Level 2 Performance Evaluation (2-PE) raised questions about the ability of medical schools to ensure the clinical skills competence of graduating students. In February 2021, representatives from all Florida, United States, allopathic and osteopathic schools initiated a collaboration to address this critically important issue in the evolving landscape of medical education. A 5-point Likert scale survey of all members (n=18/20 individuals representing 10/10 institutions) reveals that initial interest in joining the collaboration was high among both individuals (mean 4.78, SD 0.43) and institutions (mean 4.69, SD 0.48). Most individuals (mean 4.78, SD 0.55) and institutions (mean 4.53, SD 0.72) are highly satisfied with their decision to join. Members most commonly cited a "desire to establish a shared assessment in place of Step 2 CS/2-PE" as their most important reason for joining. Experienced benefits of membership were ranked as the following: 1) Networking, 2) Shared resources for curriculum implementation, 3) Scholarship, and 4) Work towards a shared assessment in place of Step 2 CS/2-PE. Challenges of membership were ranked as the following: 1) Logistics such as scheduling and technology, 2) Agreement on common goals, 3) Total time commitment, and 4) Large group size. Members cited the "administration of a joint assessment pilot" as the highest priority for the coming year. Florida has successfully launched a regional consortium for the assessment of clinical skills competency with high levels of member satisfaction which may serve as a model for future regional consortia.

Developing Awareness and Allies: Simulating Difficult Conversations about Microaggressions for Faculty and Students.

OBJECTIVES: Discrimination and bias in clinical training often take the form of microaggressions, which, albeit unintentional, are detrimental to the learning environment and well-being of students. Although there are a few reports of medical schools training students to respond to microaggressions, none have included a complementery student-led faculty training module. The aim of this study was to develop and evaluate a case-based approach to improving student resilience and increasing faculty awareness of microaggressions in the clinical setting. METHODS: We created four realistic cases of microaggressions and uncomfortable conversations, based on students' experiences on the wards, to implement training for incoming third-year students and their core faculty. Standardized patients were trained to effectively portray discriminatory faculty, residents, and patients. Institutional review board-approved surveys were administered and statistically analyzed to evaluate for efficacy. RESULTS: Students had greater mean confidence scores for responding to microaggressions immediately and at 6 months after the sessions (P < 0.05). Faculty showed improved mean confidence and understanding of the definition of a microaggression (P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: This approach had results similar to other studies, with the additional benefit of training faculty with the same scenarios. We believe that this method helped bridge the gap between students' notions of discrimination and faculty understanding of microaggressions.