Must Reads

What is a ‘Must Read’ for those interested in medical education?

Each month, we identify 3-4 noteworthy articles from the health professions education literature and label them as “must reads.” Selection is based on several criteria including originality and methodological rigor. Our process includes a formal search of the peer-reviewed literature, screening titles and abstracts, full text review, and an editorial meeting to achieve consensus.

Who are we and why are we doing this?

Our reviewers include individuals with expertise in teaching, educational oversight, and research as well as those who are beginning their careers as educational scholars.

The volume of health professions education articles has become overwhelming. In curating some of the best new published papers, we hope to make it easier for all of us to keep abreast of cutting edge educational scholarship and practices.

We’d welcome involvement in the selection process. Reviewers can earn CME credit and contribute to Must Reads research. If you are interested in supporting this work or have perspectives to share, please email Sean Tackett: stacket1@jhmi.edu.

You can also follow @MedEdMustReads on X (aka Twitter) to be notified when new must read articles are selected and sign up to receive an email each month.

(Current Reviewers: Kara Alcegueire, Paul Bain, Suni Ebby, Scott Kinkade, Pranav Kotamraju, Viviane Liao, Erica Lin, Liju Mathew, Milad Memari, Pallavi Menon, Amin Nakhostin-Ansari, Ashley Paul, Julianne Perretta, Katherine Senko, Julia Shalen, Sean Tackett, Scott Wright)

Featured This Month

The Gist

• Innovation report where 4 different AI tools were used to convert a pharmacology clinical case into a cinematic narrative that included AI-generated images and a theme song.
• The process was low-cost, students preferred the format, and they did well on the exam.

Why This is a Must Read

Generative AI can make education more exciting and effective. This article’s clear descriptions of tools used, prompting strategies, time required, and final products provide an example that others can follow.

The Gist

• Overview of issues to consider when using generative AI for assessment in health professions education.
• Discusses theoretical frameworks, AI for formative and summative assessment, faculty development, and ethical matters.

Why This is a Must Read

AI can expand educator capacity and improve personalization and standardization in assessment. This article may be a useful reference for those seeking to effectively use AI in assessments of, for, and as learning.

The Gist

• Commentary on a “shadow economy” – where students accumulate extracurricular accomplishments to distinguish themselves –resulting from changes to grading policies.
• Characterizes residency application and selection as a complex adaptive system that produces unanticipated outcomes, and suggests ways to mitigate negative consequences.

Why This is a Must Read

Systems perform according to their design. This article describes how pass/fail grading creates new incentives in the system that encourage effort in non-clinical activities, and argues that medical education must remain oriented to preparing clinically excellent providers.

Featured

The Gist

• Interviews of 12 residents from different specialties to understand their perceptions of appreciation.
• Residents experienced appreciation differently based on their roles as learners, physicians, or employees; any form of appreciation improved confidence and performance.

Why This is a Must Read

It’s always nice to feel appreciated, and residents bring value to clinical settings. This article provides a structure for the various ways to express appreciation and ensure residents feel fulfillment in their efforts.

The Gist

• Commentary that relates brand management principles to physicians’ professional identities and their changes over a career.
• Defines brand identity, image, delivery, experience, and equity for academic medicine.

Why This is a Must Read

Medical education can learn a lot from other fields. This article takes away the commercialism and self-promotion from brand management to suggest a new way to align career choices with personal strengths and values.

The Gist

• Innovation report describing the first full cohort from a program that paired students with patient-teachers across all 4 years of medical school.
• The program had over 100 student-patient pairs, was well-received by students and patients, and gave students a better understanding of an individual’s experience with illness.

Why This is a Must Read

Patients are often the best teachers, but involving them in medical education can be challenging. This article illustrates a successful pilot expanded to the whole curriculum and offers a new model for longitudinal partnerships between patients and students.

The Gist

• Commentary offering guidance on curricula that address ableism.
• Suggests 3 strategies: (1) understand ableism as one of several dimensions of someone’s identity; (2) use the see-name-understand-act approach to address ableism in the workplace; and (3) prepare faculty to model and teach ableism-awareness.

Why This is a Must Read

Ableism, a belief that typical abilities are superior, is common in healthcare. This article provides well-organized, practical suggestions for addressing ableism and creating more inclusive learning environments.

The Gist

• Commentary on how artificial intelligence (AI) technologies can lessen reducible and irreducible uncertainties in medicine.
• Describes AI’s potential to address biases, knowledge gaps, and prognostic challenges and suggests priorities for medical education.

Why This is a Must Read

Healthcare is complex and uncertainty is inevitable. This article helps us understand AI’s strengths and limitations in handling uncertainty and provides ideas for designing educational programs.

The Gist

• Systematic review and network meta-analysis of 80 randomized controlled trials from medical education that compared lectures to 1 of 6 other educational methods.
• Lectures had worse learning outcomes and student satisfaction in nearly every comparison.

Why This is a Must Read

Lectures are the bedrock of many medical education programs but often treat learners as passive recipients of information. This study supports limiting time in lecture in favor of active methods that make learning more efficient and enjoyable.