The Association of American Medical Colleges’ Central Group on Educational Affairs selected five projects by Wayne State University of Medicine students, faculty and administrators for presentation at the group’s spring conference, held March 27-29 at DeVos Place Convention Center in Grand Rapids.
Sophomore medical student Jerry Chen was among the students attending, to present “Assessing the Role of Pre-clerkship Medical Students in Improving Patient Safety.”
The project examined how pre-clerkship medical students might provide an unbiased and focused set of eyes during patient safety rounds for procedures that the standard health care team found routine.
“The premise was that in the hierarchical nature of medical learning, a pre-clerkship medical student can focus almost solely on patient safety adherence versus other members of the rounding team (i.e. M3s and M4s and residents),” Chen said. “Our study itself had these M1/M2s rotate through the Detroit Medical Center Intensive Care Unit to do this very task, observing sanitary precaution, overall safety adherence, team communications and more. What we found was that there were multiple instances where patient safety had lapsed and no other team member noticed, whether it be hand cleaning, improper isolation or even a lack of discussion of safety parameters.”
With help from Professor of Internal Medicine Diane Levine, M.D., her department’s clerkship director, they wanted to find a way for freshman and sophomore medical students to impact patient care and health using a current skillset.
“While we may lack an in-depth knowledge about clinical presentations and the real world manifestation of diseases, I believe that all pre-clerkship students are quite eager to make a difference through similar patient safety and quality improvement projects,” Chen added.
Members of the Institute for Health Care Improvement, a student organization Dr. Levine advises, want to establish a course curriculum to implement during first and second year to learn more about patient safety rounding -- what to look out for and when, and importantly how to voice concerns – and a program for pre-clerkship students to rotate with the DMC patient safety team.
Presentations from School of Medicine students, staff and administrators included:
“Using Continuous Quality Improvement Model for Clerkship Summative Assessment Timeliness,” by Desiree Merriweather, Christopher Steffes and Jason Booza
“Older Adult Oral History Project at Extended Care Facilities for First-Year Medical Students,” by Kierstin Utter, Jennifer Mendez, Dominique Blanks, Kimberly Schroeder and Latonya Riddle-Jones
“Assessing the Role of Pre-clerkship Medical Students in Improving Patient Safety Within a Hospital Setting,” by Jerry Chen, Mohamed Nasereldin, Nikola Rakic, Spandana Alluri, Kristina Hart, Patrick Kato, Joshua Morof, Paragi Patel, Natalie Perecki, Medina Sarein and Diane Levine
“Using Overnight Extended Care Visits to Enhance Medical Education About Geriatric Falls,” Dominique Blanks and Jennifer Mendez
“One Size Does NOT Fit All: A Learner-Centric Perspective of Preparation for the USMLE STEP 1 Examination,” Alexander Swantek, Sevan Misirliyan, Hamilton Trinh, Joanna Kukla, Richard Baker and Jason Booza
The CGEA serves in a resource and advisory capacity to the Group on Education Affairs Steering Committee and the AAMC. It is one of four regions that make up the GEA, and includes Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, Wisconsin and South Dakota.
“I think it’s a great opportunity to meet other students and physicians who are interested in both patient safety and implementing new ideas to improve the overall quality of our education for all stages of our growth,” Chen said. “Conferences like this motivate us as students and educators as we learn about so many fresh perspectives and ideas regarding medicine that our colleagues are working toward.”