[Becoming a psychiatrist: an intensive induction course for trainee house officers]. / Psychiater worden: een intensieve introductiecursus voor artsen in opleiding.

Since October 2006 the specialist training for house officers in psychiatry in the province of North Holland has started with a one-week intensive induction course. The course has been designed to facilitate the transition to specialist training and to provide trainees with the tools they need for dealing with psychiatric emergencies. Fifteen house officers, divided into three focus groups, were asked for their views on the course. They gave the course a high rating and stated that it had had a positive effect on group-bonding and functioning in their subsequent training.

[In the consultation room, ready knowledge is more important than knowledge that must be looked up]. / In de spreekkamer is parate kennis belangrijker dan opzoekkennis.

Ready knowledge rules the consultation room--there is no time to look things up. The doctor attempts to find the diagnosis on the basis of a network of ready knowledge. The quality of this knowledge network determines the quality of the resultant diagnosis and of the subsequent treatment. The doctor must continually test and maintain his or her knowledge network.

An Inter- and Intra-University Comparison With Short Case-Based Testing.

Comparisons between PBL and non-PBL medical schools on problem-solving ability often show no differences. This could be either due to the fact that no difference in problem-solving skills exists or that the instruments used are inadequate. In this study a key-feature approach case-based examination was used to compare two medical schools in the Netherlands, one of which has a PBL curriculum (Maastricht) and one which has a program half way a transition from a non-PBL towards a PBL curriculum (Groningen). Differences were found both in proficiency scores and in the pattern of response times, both supporting the assumption that a PBL approach would lead to a higher level of problem solving ability. The effect size, however, is not as large as originally assumed by the PBL proponents. Conclusions must be drawn with caution, but it seems likely that a test based on large numbers of short cases is the most sensitive in detecting differences in problem solving ability between students of different curricula.