THE FLAME INITIATIVE
BACKGROUND
As a medical student, I always wished that resident and attending physicians would set aside five-minutes from their busy days for unadulterated teaching. It was apparent to me that they wanted to teach and enjoyed teaching, but that there were barriers limiting them: TIME, RESOURCES, and CONFIDENCE. They didn't have easy-to-use teaching resources readily-accessible to overcome any concerns regarding confidence or time as barriers. Thus, it has long been my goal to break down these barriers! FLAME's philosophy is simple. We hope to empower busy medical professionals to teach by making relevant, efficient, and reliable teaching resources as instantaneously accessible as possible AND to promote learning through teaching!
METHODOLOGY
AN EXAMPLE
A resident and medical student assess a pregnant patient together who just arrived seizing. After evaluating, diagnosing, and stabilizing this patient with eclampsia, the resident is adrenally-supercharged, and the student is spellbound. The resident is busy, has orders to place, notes to write, and sweet-potato fries to consume, but maybe, just maybe, she has 5 minutes—five minutes she can spend teaching this awestruck medical student. Luckily, there is already a presentation lying gleaming and glowing on our website. Without any preparation, the resident is now armed and ready to give a five-minute presentation on eclampsia.
LEARNING THEORY
THE 5-MINUTE CHALLENGE
Imagine if every OBGYN resident devoted FIVE MINUTES of their day giving ONE PRESENTATION. Imagine if they gave two. Imagine if every resident of every medical specialty at UCI devoted five minutes each day. The benefits of such an inconsequent 5-minute investment would be legion.
LONG-TERM GOALS
BACKGROUND
As a medical student, I always wished that resident and attending physicians would set aside five-minutes from their busy days for unadulterated teaching. It was apparent to me that they wanted to teach and enjoyed teaching, but that there were barriers limiting them: TIME, RESOURCES, and CONFIDENCE. They didn't have easy-to-use teaching resources readily-accessible to overcome any concerns regarding confidence or time as barriers. Thus, it has long been my goal to break down these barriers! FLAME's philosophy is simple. We hope to empower busy medical professionals to teach by making relevant, efficient, and reliable teaching resources as instantaneously accessible as possible AND to promote learning through teaching!
METHODOLOGY
- The Association of Professors of Gynecology and Obstetrics (APGO) have identified 58 broad educational topic areas that they recommend be encompassed into OBGYN clerkship curriculums.
- The FLAME initiative seeks to create 250+ five minute-long presentations to cover every subject that APGO feels medical students should learn during their OBGYN clerkship.
- The FLAMEs may incorporate pictures and videos for the visual learners, can have links to practice bulletins and important articles for the independent learners, and can even have questions at the end for the Socratic fans.
- They are meant to be used in the thick of the patient day in connection with patient encounters to maximize the educational and clinical benefit to both the learner and the teacher.
AN EXAMPLE
A resident and medical student assess a pregnant patient together who just arrived seizing. After evaluating, diagnosing, and stabilizing this patient with eclampsia, the resident is adrenally-supercharged, and the student is spellbound. The resident is busy, has orders to place, notes to write, and sweet-potato fries to consume, but maybe, just maybe, she has 5 minutes—five minutes she can spend teaching this awestruck medical student. Luckily, there is already a presentation lying gleaming and glowing on our website. Without any preparation, the resident is now armed and ready to give a five-minute presentation on eclampsia.
LEARNING THEORY
- The med student gets one-on-one instruction that is both system-based and case-based in nature, that encompasses didactic and socratic methodology, and synergizes visual, aural, and social learning theories.
- The resident has the opportunity to both TEACH and LEARN BY TEACHING.
- The med student appreciates the resident spending more dedicated time teaching them. The resident feels fulfilled by teaching more. The student-resident relationship is strengthened.
- While the novelty of the FLAME focuses on en vivo learning opportunities, the student and/or resident may also navigate to the website at any time for self-directed learning to supplement their current formal OBGYN clerkship teaching.
THE 5-MINUTE CHALLENGE
Imagine if every OBGYN resident devoted FIVE MINUTES of their day giving ONE PRESENTATION. Imagine if they gave two. Imagine if every resident of every medical specialty at UCI devoted five minutes each day. The benefits of such an inconsequent 5-minute investment would be legion.
LONG-TERM GOALS
- Following rolling out the FLAME in OBGYN, we hope to branch out and recruit other specialties to join. We are now rolling out FLAMEs for FAMILY MEDICINE & EMERGENCY MEDICINE
- We are currently searching for funding opportunities to help make the FLAME even more accessible by creating an app for both Apple and Android platforms. (Phase II)
- For those who would like to maximize their learning while on the go, a podcast for each lecture will ultimately be readily made for subscribers to the FLAME podcast. (Phase III)
- While the FLAME focuses on medical student education, the FLARE Initiative is also underway which will target resident-level topics (Five-minute Lectures Accelerating Resident Education). This program will be perfect for senior residents and/or fellows to teach junior residents, and will also serve as an important resource for CREOG and Board preparation. Coming soon.