In order to insure the quality and breadth of our educational program, we have developed a comprehensive three-year curriculum of interactive and didactic learning experiences. We are dedicated to the development of our housestaff in all aspects of the art and science of pediatrics, and we feel that the breadth and depth of our curriculum accurately reflects this commitment.
Noon Conference: Occurring daily, except Thursdays, the majority of our core curriculum is presented by faculty in general pediatrics, subspecialty pediatrics and other disciplines. Our goal is to round out your educational experience through stimulating presentations covering a comprehensive array of topics.
Morning Report: Occurring every Wednesday and Friday morning, this informal and interactive conference utilizes cases to help strengthen skills in differential diagnosis and management of both common and rare pediatric issues. The atmosphere is fun and collegial, and involves students, housestaff, and faculty.
Grand Rounds: Thursday at noon is reserved for this conference which utilizes both local experts and national speakers who present on topics ranging from molecular biology, to community advocacy, to violence in the media. Lunch is provided by the Department of Pediatrics.
Board Prep: This monthly conference utilizes an audience response system to enable housestaff to engage in practice answering boards-type questions. Each resident has their own responder, and each answers questions. The system tallies up all the answers, and displays how the group did together as a whole. The group can then review the answer and analyze the question to improve test-taking skills. The response system brings each participant into the game, and the action is fast and fun.
CCEBM: Our Clinical Curiosity and Evidence Based Medicine serves as our journal club. It is held once or twice a month on Friday mornings. The curriculum consists of a focused interactive didactic series about how to read and interpret the literature using a structured methodology. Armed with this expertise, housestaff then address clinical and public policy questions of significance to them using the best available evidence, and present their findings to their peers.
Resident Conferences: Each third-year resident is expected to present a noon conference on the topic of their choice. Topics have ranged from breast feeding, to international health, to the intricacies of health care access in this country.
Outpatient Morning Conference: Daily, except Wednesday and Friday, faculty and residents working in the Urgent Care Clinic gather to spend an hour in interactive discussion of issues relating to ambulatory pediatrics. Topics include common infections, child behavior issues, and pediatric billing and coding.
Morbidity and Mortality Conference: Once a month, housestaff and attendings participate in this multi-disciplinary conference which includes pediatrics, surgery, ICU staff, pathology and radiology. Interesting cases, deaths and unusual diagnoses are discussed.
Ethical Dilemmas and Tough Cases: As pediatricians, we see lots of joy, but also sorrow, sadness, and death and dying. To help us all address these tough cases and ethical dilemmas, we hold regular meetings to discuss the human issues affecting patients, families and housestaff in a supportive, open, and honest forum with faculty specializing in ethics, death, and dying.
Radiology Rounds: Residents round daily with our pediatric radiologists during their inpatient experiences. All new studies are reviewed and interpretation is discussed. In 2006, we went online with a web-based radiology system, enabling the viewing of radiologic studies from anywhere in the hospital, and significantly enhancing our teaching and learning about imaging.
Ethics: The UNM Health Sciences Center has an online curriculum for housestaff to help address learning needs in the realm of ethics. Additional ethics information may be found at: http://hsc.unm.edu/ethics. Further, there are regular ethics seminars available to any and all interested in further exploring this essential domain of medicine.
