Didactics

Didactics are fundamental to our residency program, and they provides ample learning opportunities to prepare residents for both board exams and their careers. Residents are expected to attend all medicine sessions while rotating on medicine and likewise all pediatrics sessions while rotating on pediatrics. However, residents are welcome to attend any of the didactics sessions at any time.  The resident-run curriculum committee assists in determining didactic topics.

Morning/Noon Report

The post-call medicine wards team presents patient cases selected from the previous night's admissions during morning/noon report. These reports are discussion-oriented, evidenced-based, and include review of important elements from the history and physical, laboratory findings, EKGs, and imaging studies. Faculty are present to lead discussion, help residents expand their list of different diagnoses, offer suggestions regarding management, and provide teaching points. Principles of medicine seen frequently on board exams are emphasized. On pediatrics, interesting past patient cases are presented daily by residents or chief residents in group or classic didactic sessions.

Internal Medicine Afternoon Didactics 

One day per week, residents rotating on Internal Medicine benefit from additional afternoon didactics.  Examples of these lectures are our “Intern Essentials” lecture series and our “Guidelines” lecture series.

Core Conferences / Grand Rounds

At Children's Hospital, daily noon conferences consist of faculty-delivered didactics, question-and-answer sessions, journal article reviews, case presentations, and professionalism forums. These sessions concentrate on fundamental clinical competencies and are designed to expose residents to the entire breadth of each specialty over the span of their residency career. Grand Rounds, which are presented weekly by medicine and pediatrics, provide residents with exposure to both high-level concepts and cutting-edge developments.

MKSAP Lectures / Peds Board Review

Each month, MKSAP topics are assigned by the medicine department. During noon conference, MKSAP questions are incorporated to lectures to aid memory recall.  We have a pediatrics board review conference every month at Children's Hospital which covers PREP and MedStudy questions. All residents receive MKSAP, PREP, and MedStudy at no cost to help with board prep.

Ambulatory & Hospitalist, and HIV Track Conferences

For residents with a strong interest in ambulatory or hospitalist medicine, tracks are available to which the resident may commit. These tracks are run by dedicated ambulatory and hospital-based faculty, respectively. Residents in these tracks are required to prepare didactic sessions which they present to fellow residents and faculty members, for critique and open discussion. Residents not in these tracks are welcome to attend these conferences.

Med-Peds Conference 

Med/Peds also hosts its own conference twice monthly which consists of a resident- or faculty-delivered didactic session or literature review -- special attention is given to topics that are unique to Med-Peds or that pose a challenge in that the management is very different for pediatric and adult populations.