Articles: interviews.
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Faecal Immunochemical Testing (FIT) is now core to the management of patients presenting in primary care with symptoms of possible colorectal cancer. Patients with a positive FIT (≥10μg Hb/g faeces) qualify for an urgent suspected cancer referral. FIT negative patients are typically managed in primary care or referred through routine pathways. ⋯ Symptomatic FIT is largely seen as beneficial; however, health professionals would welcome further evidence and guidance around optimal application.
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Obstetrics and gynecology (OBGYN) is becoming increasingly competitive among medical specialties. As a result, many medical schools have frameworks to help their students increase their competitiveness to maximize chances of a successful match. However, "boot camps" have traditionally been geared toward the transition to intern year and not to sub-internships during the fourth year of medical school. We aimed to develop a boot camp for rising fourth-year medical students planning to apply into OBGYN before the initiation of their sub-internships and interview season. ⋯ In light of the increasing residency match competitiveness, it is crucial to investigate programs that can assist students in developing stronger applications. This reproducible intervention utilizes few resources and can be implemented at most medical schools to better support their OBGYN applicants.
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Historically in medicine and beyond, the understanding of and treatment of pain is based on finding tissue injury. The fact that for chronic pain, there often is no (longer) any traceable tissue injury, in combination with the fact that pain essentially is a private experience, poses a challenge for clinical communication. This paper therefore examines how pain is linguistically and interactionally constructed as invisible. ⋯ The discussion explores how on these three levels, notions of the abnormal or deviant body come into play, in which patients and health professionals complexly construct pain both as not normal (i.e. not a neutral or desirable state of being), while, at the same time, the lack of traceable tissue injury is constructed as medically normal for chronic pain. This also shows how patients and healthcare providers often orient to the stigma around chronic pain.
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Clinical coding allows for structured and standardised recording of patients' electronic healthcare records. How clinical and non-clinical staff in general practice approach clinical coding is poorly understood. ⋯ This study demonstrates the complexity of clinical coding in primary care. Clinical and non-clinical staff spoke of systems that lacked intuitiveness, and the challenges of multimorbidity and time pressures when coding in clinical situations. These challenges are likely to be exacerbated in socioeconomically deprived areas, leading to underreporting of disease in these areas. Challenges of clinical coding may lead to implications for data quality, particularly the validity of research findings generated from studies reliant on clinical coding from primary care. There are also consequences for patient care. Participants cared about coding quality and wanted a better way of using coding. There is a need to explore technological and non-technological solutions, such as artificial intelligence, training, and education to unburden people using clinical coding in primary care.
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Enhancing residency recruitment with modifications to interviews has been an area of national interest, further catalyzed by the transition to universal virtual interviewing (UVI). In 2018, our internal medicine residency program redesigned the recruitment process using virtual interviews. ⋯ Virtual interviews were highly rated with increased preference following universal adoption. Optional AVDs separated from virtual interviews enhance applicant understanding of the program and were more effective when offered in-person before the pandemic-related restrictions. As programs begin to reintroduce in-person elements, the SPLIT recruitment model offers an innovative approach that addresses applicant and program needs.