Reflection
Through both assignments, I succeeded in some areas while lacking in others. An area that I need to work on includes “strengthening your source use practices (including, evaluating, integrating, quoting, paraphrasing, summarizing, synthesizing, analyzing, and citing sources.” When summarizing the “New York Times article”, I struggled with attempting to summarize and paraphrase without being redundant or sounding as if I plagiarized. I also struggled with the fifth learning outcome that states “engage in genre analysis and multimodal composing to explore effective writing across disciplinary contexts and beyond.” I feel that my effectiveness in analyzing the writing of the author lacked specificity. Despite these struggles, I was successful in other areas. Regarding the seventh learning outcome, “practice using various library resources, online databases, and the Internet to locate sources appropriate to your writing projects”, I was able to locate articles that were suitable for the task at hand. Another strength in this assignment was my ability to “enhance strategies for readings, drafting, revising, editing, and self-assessment.” Through the help of my peer-readers and editors, I was able to use their constructive criticism to revise my essay to further enhance my skills. These abilities were also useful when analyzing the research article.
First Draft
The future of medicine lies in the hands of the current medical school students who will soon become physicians, surgeons, and caregivers. It is important that these medical students are continuously aware of the changes that are occurring within the medical schools and also within the hospitals. There continues to be changes made in policies that are greatly affecting the amount of training and first-hand experiences that these students undergo. These changes were made when the question of the mental and physical health of medical students rose, as a response to the increasing rates of depression and exhaustion in medical students. As a result, the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, whose responsibility is to oversee the training and residential programs, began to limit the number of hours students could spend training and working. Now the question of whether or not surgeons’ training and skills are being compromised in response to the limiting of their training hours is being raised. In The New York Times, “ Are Today’s Surgeons Unprepared?”, published in 2013, Pauline W Chen uses both personal experiences and evidence from multiple studies to inform the public, as well as medical professionals, about the issues of inadequate training in surgical residency training programs as a result of changes in policy.
The author not only uses scientific research to support the main argument, but she also uses personal experiences to further enhance her claim, as well as provide a way for readers to understand the information that is being presented. The writer begins by explaining her thoughts on the necessary skills she believed to have lacked in order to become a surgeon when she witnessed a fellow surgeon performing surgeries at a fast rate, having minimal post-operation complications, and outperforming those that were at the same level. Although this surgeon was more experienced than she was, when he was at her level, he was able to perform various surgeries at a fast pace and had more knowledge in specific areas. She was curious as to why there was such a large gap between her fellow surgeons and those who had only a couple years more of experience. When she questioned this talented surgeon and was informed about the policy change, she began to do more research. She found the source of the problem to be the change in hours, limiting the amount of time students can spend practicing and learning surgeries. In a study done to assess the skills of surgical students entering residency, researchers found that a large number of residents lacked valuable experience and knowledge in certain areas that related to hands-on experiences. More then 20% of residential program directors felt as if the residents were not fully prepared, 66% of residents could not perform surgeries without supervision, and 34% could not perform basic sutures. The author depicted this information in a way that was easy to understand the medical jargon and explained the importance of hands-on experiences for surgeons.
The author continues to advocate for change in this policy through her use of evidence from various medical professionals, as well as studies. She clearly depicts how despite advances in medical laboratories that are designed to replicate an actual operating room, it is not sufficient enough to train residents properly. She acknowledges the changes that are being made to improve education but points out where they fail to make a difference. By doing so, she is able to adhere not only to medical professionals but the general public as well, that there must be changes made to improve the experiences of medical students.
References
Pauline W. Chen, M. (2013, December 12). Are Today’s New Surgeons Unprepared? Retrieved from https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/12/are-todays-new-surgeons-unprepared/
Final Draft
The future of medicine lies in the hands of the current medical school students who will soon become physicians, surgeons, and caregivers. It is important that these medical students are continuously aware of the changes that are occurring within the medical schools and also within health care. There continues to be changes made in policies that are greatly affecting the amount of training and first-hand experiences that these students undergo. These changes were made when the question of the mental and physical health of medical students rose, as a response to the increasing rates of depression and exhaustion in medical students. The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, whose responsibility is to oversee the training and residential programs, began to limit the number of hours students could spend training and working. Now the question of whether or not surgeons’ training and skills are being compromised in response to the limiting of their training hours is being raised. In The New York Times, “ Are Today’s Surgeons Unprepared?”, published in 2013, Pauline W Chen succeeds in using both personal experiences and evidence from multiple studies to inform the public, as well as medical professionals, about the issues of inadequate training in surgical residency training programs as a result of changes in policy.
Chen not only uses scientific research to support the main argument, but she also uses personal experiences to further enhance her claim and provide a way for readers to understand the information that is being presented. The writer, who was a resident in the surgical field, begins by reflecting about a time in which she felt she lacked the necessary skills to become a surgeon. She felt this way after witnessing a fellow surgeon performing surgeries at a fast rate, having minimal post-operation complications, and outperforming those that were at the same level. Although this surgeon was more experienced than she was, when he was at her level, he was able to perform various surgeries at a fast pace and had more knowledge in specific areas. She was curious as to why there was such a large gap between her fellow surgeons and those who had only a couple years more of experience. When she questioned this talented surgeon and was informed about the policy change, she began to do more research. She found the source of the problem to be the change in hours, limiting the number of time students can spend practicing and learning surgeries. In a study done to assess the skills of surgical students entering residency, researchers found that a large number of residents lacked valuable experience and knowledge in certain areas related to hands-on experiences. More then 20% of residential program directors felt as if the residents were not fully prepared, 66% of residents could not perform surgeries without supervision, and 34% could not perform basic sutures. The medical jargon may have been confusing to readers who do not have the knowledge, but Chen depicted this information in a way that was easy to understand the medical jargon. She explained the importance of hands-on experiences for surgeons through the use of personal experiences. The personal story enhanced the reader’s interest and showed how realistic this issue is.
Chen continues to advocate for change in this policy through her use of evidence from various medical professionals, as well as studies. She clearly depicts how the improvements made in medical laboratories to replicate an actual operating room are still not sufficient enough to train residents properly. She acknowledges the changes that are being made to improve education but points out where they fail to make a difference. By doing so, she is able to adhere not only to medical professionals but the general public as well, that there must be changes made to improve the experiences of medical students.
References
Pauline W. Chen, M. (2013, December 12). Are Today’s New Surgeons Unprepared? Retrieved from https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/12/are-todays-new-surgeons-unprepared/
Scholarly Analysis
First Draft
A study named “General Surgery Residency Inadequately Prepares Trainees for Fellowship: Results of a Survey of Fellowship Program Directors”, was done in September 2013 to identify the issue of the decrease in skills of surgical residents. Within the introduction to this experiment, the authors successfully identifies the issues at hand and states that they have performed studies to identify the cause of these issues. The article is in IMRAD form and follows the pattern of beginning with a general explanation of the issue, proceeding into the specific issue at hand, followed by the experiment and how it supports and provides a solution to that particular issue. When explaining the issue at hand, which is the decrease in surgical skills due to the limitations surrounding how many hours residents are allowed to work and practice for, the authors use non-hedging language. They do not express hesitancy or uncertainty and feel strongly that there is a decrease in surgical skills of residents because of the support from their research. With the use of words such as, “undoubting” and “certainty”, they stress how accurate they believe their findings are and assist in convincing their readers that the information that they are presenting to them is accurate. The purpose of the study is stated using passive language and suggests that further research should be done to improve the general surgery training programs with the use of the data obtained from the study.
The methods section of this research paper proceeds the introduction and clearly states how the experiment was implemented, allowing for the possibility of this experiment being repeated. This study was done through an electronic survey given to 145 accredited fellowships, placing emphasis on the reliability of their sources. The format of the questions and how many questions were specified. When depicting the answers of open-ended questions, they used passive language, explaining how the answers were assessed and analyzed to identify the gaps in the skills of the residents.
The methods section is followed by the results section, in which each of the results was separated into categories. Each domain was specific to a particular area of skills that was being studied in order to identify which specifically contained gaps in training. Each of the results from every domain was placed into a table, giving the readers a visual of all of the information, allowing for the information to be processed easily. The authors then specified the trends in each table to point out the gaps in that are of expertise. This reduces the results and allows the author to convince the readers that their information is consistent and accurate. An example is table 7, which is used to stress how the decrease in the number of hours used to practice has caused a decrease in the ability for surgical residents to perform surgeries independently.
The discussion section states how the data obtained from the study answers the question at hand while also providing information for further research that maybe done in the future. Through the use of hedging language, the scientists explained how their data supported their argument that their has been a decrease in the skills of surgical residents and in specific areas. This hedging language implies that their needs to be more research done and that their still maybe gaps in the issue. This suggests the cause to be the change in policy and the inability of training programs to implement proper training mechanism and procedures. The researchers also discussed how their may have been limitations in their data due to the fact that the study was done in a particular time frame and to only accredited training programs. This could have led to a level of bias in their data due to the high standards set by the training programs.
Overall, this article, the IMRAD format is used and allows for a clear flow of information for the reader. The information follows a pattern of beginning with the general and listing specifics. Through the use of various techniques, such as passive language and hedging language, the researchers clearly presented their finding and gave suggestions for further research.
References
Matter SG, Alseidi AA, Jones DB, Jeyarajah DR, Swanstrom LL, Aye RW, Wexner SD, Martinez JM, Ross SB, Awad MM, et al. General Surgeru Residency Inadequately Prepares Trainees for Fellowship. Annals of Surgery. 2013;258(3):440-449.doi:10.1097/sla.0b013e3182a191ca
Final Draft
A study named “General Surgery Residency Inadequately Prepares Trainees for Fellowship: Results of a Survey of Fellowship Program Directors”, was published to identify the cause in the decrease in skills of surgical residents (Mattar et al. 2013). In the introduction, the authors state that they have successfully performed studies to identify the cause in the decrease in skills of surgical residents. The article is in IMRAD form and follows the pattern of beginning with a general explanation of the decrease in skills of surgical residents, followed by a methods section describing the procedure of the experiment. When explaining the decrease in surgical skills due to the limitations surrounding how many hours residents are allowed to work and practice for, the authors use non-hedging language. They do not express hesitancy or uncertainty and feel strongly that there is a decrease in surgical skills of residents because of the support from their research. However, they also use hedging language such as The purpose of the study is stated using passive language and suggests that further research should be done to improve the general surgery training programs with the use of the data obtained from the study. Mattar and the other researchers successfully present the data collected through the use of various techniques, such as passive language and hedging language.
The methods section proceeds the introduction and clearly states how the experiment was implemented, allowing for the possibility of this experiment being repeated. This study was done through an electronic survey given to 145 accredited fellowships, placing emphasis on the reliability of their sources. The format of the questions and how many questions were specified. The article states that “The qualitative written responses to the open-ended reflective questions were reviewed to identify themes”. When depicting the answers of open-ended questions, they used passive language, explaining how the answers were assessed and analyzed to identify the gaps in the skills of the residents.
The methods section is followed by the results section, in which each of the results was separated into categories. Each domain was specific to a particular area of skills that were being studied in order to identify which specifically contained gaps in training. Each of the results from every domain was placed into a table, giving a visual of all of the information, allowing for the information to be processed easily. The authors then specified the trends in each table to point out the gaps in that area of expertise. This reduces the results and allows the author to convince the readers that their information is consistent and accurate. An example is table 7, which is used to stress how the decrease in the number of hours used to practice has caused a decrease in the ability for surgical residents to perform surgeries independently.
The discussion section states how the data obtained from the study answers the research question while also providing information for further research that may be done in the future. Through the use of non-hedging language, the scientists explained how their data supported their argument that there has been a decrease in the skills of surgical residents and in specific areas. With the use of words such as, “undoubting” and “certainty”, they stress how accurate they believe their findings are and assist in convincing their readers that the information that they are presenting is accurate. The researchers also discussed how there may have been limitations in their data because the study was done in a particular time frame and to only accredited training programs. This could have led to a level of bias in their data due to the high standards set by the training programs.
Overall, in this article, the IMRAD format is used and allows for a clear flow of information for the reader. The information follows a pattern of beginning with the general and listing specifics. Through the use of various techniques, such as passive language and non-hedging language, the researchers clearly presented their finding and gave suggestions for further research.
References
Matter SG, Alseidi AA, Jones DB, Jeyarajah DR, Swanstrom LL, Aye RW, Wexner SD, Martinez JM, Ross SB, Awad MM, et al. General Surgeru Residency Inadequately Prepares Trainees for Fellowship. Annals of Surgery. 2013;258(3):440-449.doi:10.1097/sla.0b013e3182a191ca
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