Experiences of Residents and Fellows at Mayo Clinic After the Rapid Implementation of Telemedicine During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

OBJECTIVE: The COVID-19 pandemic led to many changes across medical organizations and graduate medical education programs nationwide including the rapid implementation of telemedicine as a modality for delivering health care. The purpose of this study was to investigate the telemedicine experiences of residents and fellows with their self-reported level of preparedness, impact on their education including precepting, skill development, and patient-physician relationships, and perceptions of telehealth platforms and curricula in the future. METHODS: A total of 365 Mayo Clinic residents and fellows across three sites (Florida, Arizona, and Minnesota) were identified as trainees who conducted at least one telemedicine encounter from January 1, 2020 to June 30, 2020 and were sent an electronic survey by e-mail. RESULTS: There was a total of 103 completed surveys across various specialties with 58.3% female respondents, 63.1% residents, 35.0% fellows and 77.7% of respondents who attended medical school in the United States. Most trainees reported having very little to no exposure to telemedicine in their medical careers before the pandemic. The majority were satisfied with their first telemedicine encounter and found precepting comparable to in-person visits. The trainees in this study had a favorable view with 98.1% believing telemedicine will play a more prevalent role in the future and most agreed this should be included in medical school and residency training. CONCLUSION: Our survey found that after the implementation of telemedicine during the COVID-19 pandemic, the experiences of trainees at a multi-site academic center were overall positive. More research is needed on the perceptions of skill development (physical exam and history taking) during a telemedicine encounter and outlining an optimal telemedicine curriculum that can improve confidence in trainees.

Screening for Diabetic Retinopathy with a Nonmydriatic Ultra-Wide-Field Retina Camera by Family Medicine Physicians.

PURPOSE: Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is the leading cause of blindness among working-aged adults aged 20 to 74 years. Despite professional association guidelines that recommend yearly screening for DR, only about 60% of Americans with diabetes mellitus (DM) receive annual examinations. The purpose of this 2-phase study was to determine the ability of family medicine (FM) physicians to accurately interpret retinal images of patients with DM. METHODS: Five FM physicians received a 1-hour lecture on DR by a retinal specialist after which the physicians were shown 30 ultrawide-field retina images and asked to determine whether the images contained signs of DR (phase 1). PATIENTS: Patients with DM who had not received an eye examination within the past year underwent nonmydriatic retinal photography in a FM clinic (phase 2). The 5 FM physicians were asked to evaluate the images for signs of DR and the images were simultaneously sent to a retinal specialist for independent interpretation. The diagnoses of the FM physicians and retina specialist were compared. Patients were informed of their results and were asked to complete a brief telephone survey regarding their experience with the screening process. RESULTS: Thirty retina images, 5 with DR and 25 without DR, were included in the postlecture assessment. Each of the 30 images was reviewed by all 5 FM physicians. Of the 5 images with DR, 3 were correctly diagnosed by all 5 FM physicians, 1 was correctly diagnosed by 4, and 1 was accurately diagnosed by 3. Overall accuracy for the 5 FM physicians was 100%, 100%, 100%, 97%, and 87%. Among the 34 patients included in phase 2, 3 (8%) were diagnosed with DR by the retinal specialist but 8 (24%) were diagnosed with DR by the FM physicians. Of the 3 patients with DR confirmed by the retinal specialist, only 1 was detected by the FM physicians (sensitivity, 33%; 95% CI, 1% to 91%). Of the 31 patients without DR as determined by the retinal specialist, 24 were accurately diagnosed by the FM physicians (specificity, 77%; 95% CI, 59% to 90%). The screening procedure was considered easy/efficient by 28 of 31 (90%) respondents. CONCLUSION: To improve early detection of DR new screening methods should be considered. FM physicians were able to accurately identify DR on postlecture images but were not as accurate when evaluating images taken from patients in the FM clinic. Patients found the screening process to be easy and efficient. This study was limited by the small sample size, particularly the limited number of DR cases. Future studies that include cases with a wide variation of DR severity are needed to determine the accuracy of FM physicians at detecting DR in a clinical setting.

Professionalism and inter-communication skills (ICS): a multi-site validity study assessing proficiency in core competencies and milestones in medical learners.

BACKGROUND: Interpersonal and Communication Skills (ICS) and Professionalism milestones are challenging to evaluate during medical training. Paucity in proficiency, direction and validity evidence of assessment tools of these milestones warrants further research. We validated the reliability of the previously-piloted Instrument for Communication skills and Professionalism Assessment (InCoPrA) in medical learners. METHODS: This validity approach was guided by the rigorous Kane's Framework. Faculty-raters and standardized patients (SPs) used their respective InCoPrA sub-component to assess distinctive domains pertinent to ICS and Professionalism through multiple expert-built simulated-scenarios comparable to usual care. Evaluations included; inter-rater reliability of the faculty total score; the correlation between the total score by the SPs; and the average of the total score by two-faculty members. Participants were surveyed regarding acceptability, realism, and applicability of this experience. RESULTS: Eighty trainees and 25 faculty-raters from five medical residency training sites participated. ICC of the total score between faculty-raters was generally moderate (ICC range 0.44-0.58). There was on average a moderate linear relationship between the SPs and faculty total scores (Pearson correlations range 0.23-0.44). Majority of participants ascertained receiving a meaningful, immediate, and comprehensive patient-faculty feedback. CONCLUSIONS: This work substantiated that InCoPrA was a reliable, standardized, evidence-based, and user-friendly assessment tool for ICS and Professionalism milestones. Validating InCoPrA showed generally-moderate agreeability and high acceptability. Using InCoPrA also promoted engaging all stakeholders in medical education and training-faculty, learners, and SPs-using simulation-media as pathway for comprehensive feedback of milestones growth.

Catamenial rectal bleeding due to invasive endometriosis: a case report.

BACKGROUND: Although gastrointestinal involvement is the most common site for extra-genital endometriosis, deep infiltrative endometriosis, which affects the mucosal layer, is very rare. CASE PRESENTATION: We present a case of a 41-year-old white woman with cyclic rectal bleeding. Magnetic resonance imaging was done, together with colonoscopy and histologic staining of biopsied samples, which led to the final diagnosis of intestinal invasive endometriosis with recto-sigmoid stricture. Our patient was treated symptomatically with stool softeners. CONCLUSION: This case provides a rare example of catamenial bleeding. It is important to keep invasive endometriosis on the differential diagnosis whenever a premenopausal woman has cyclical rectal bleeding.