For the ALiEM – Annals of EM global journal club on the article “Emergency Department Computed Tomography Utilization in the United States and Canada”, discuss question number 1 on the topic of bias:
The authors use distinct methods for tallying computed tomography (CT) use in the 2 countries. List the biases that could occur in counting CTs by each method.
CT imaging is a powerful tool in diagnosing pathological medical conditions. Despite this, there is appropriate concern about the “magnitude of imaging-related financial costs and radiation induced malignancies.” In this month’s Annals of Emergency Medicine journal publication, Berdachl et al published about “Emergency Department Computed Tomography Utilization in the United States and Canada.” This article was selected by the journal as the featured piece for a Journal Club discussion. In this inaugural global EM journal club, ALiEM and Annals are collaborating to provide a more dynamic discussion of some of the posed questions. The focus is on teaching concepts around HOW to critically appraise a journal article rather than just receive a pre-digested summary statement from social media sites and textbooks.
In an unprecedented collaborative effort to accelerate knowledge translation and education, ALiEM is officially partnering with Annals of Emergency Medicine. Together we will be hosting a global Journal Club discussion on ALiEM using the journal club questions posed in the journal’s journal club questions. Here’s how YOU and your colleagues can participate…
I was delighted to see the News and Perspectives piece in this month’s Annals of Emergency Medicine about “Social Media and Physician Learning” (free PDF). I had totally forgotten that Jan Greene, the author, had called to talk with me several months ago. In the piece, she discusses many of the issues with which I struggle:
Here are some noteworthy quotes:
There are several causes for the acutely painful scrotum. In the follow two short tutorial videos, Dr. Rahul Patwari reviews common causes, which include testicular torsion, epididymitis, orchitis, torsion of the testicular appendix, and testicular masses.
In this fifth and final installment of the Evidence Based Medicine series, Dr. Rahul Patwari reviews the concepts of: distribution of the means (with case examples), confidence intervals, accuracy, precision, and the student t-test (with an example).
At the 2013 International EM Teaching Course yesterday, Dr. Stacey Poznanski and I gave a workshop on “Powerpoint Resuscitation” to address all the widespread pitfalls which cause “death by powerpoint”. Here are the winners from the workshop competition, illustrating great examples of the coherence, redundancy, and multimedia principles that we reviewed. The slide examples are in pairs in a before-workshop and after-workshop format. Amazing what star educators can get done in a 60 minute workshop!