Abstract
BackgroundDespite its long-established importance, diagnostic reasoning (DR) education has suffered uneven implementation in medical education. The Clinical Problem Solvers (CPSolvers) podcast has emerged as a novel strategy to help teach DR through case conferences with expert diagnosticians and trainees. CPSolvers has 25,000 listeners in 147 countries. The aim of this study was to evaluate the podcast by eliciting the developers’ goals of the podcast, then determining to what extent they aligned with the listeners’ actual usage habits, features they valued, and perceptions of the podcast.MethodsWe conducted semi-structured interviews with 3 developers and 8 listeners from April–May 2020, followed by qualitative thematic analysis.ResultsThree major developer goals with sub-goals resulted:To teach diagnostic reasoning in a case-based format by (1a) teaching schemas, (1b) modeling expert diagnostic reasoning, (1c) teaching clinical knowledge, and (1d) teaching diagnostic reasoning terminology.To change the culture of medicine by (2a) promoting diversity, (2b) modeling humility and promoting psychological safety, and (2c) creating a fun, casual way to learn.To democratize the teaching of diagnostic reasoning by leveraging technology.Listeners’ usage habits, valued features, and perceptions overall strongly aligned with all these aspects, except for (1c) clinical knowledge, and (1d) diagnostic reasoning terminology. Listeners identified (1a) schemas, and (2c) promotion of psychological safety as the most valuable features of the podcast.ConclusionCPSolvers has been perceived as a highly effective and novel way to disseminate DR education in the form of case conferences, serving as an alternative to traditional in-person case conferences suspended during COVID-19. CPSolvers combines many known benefits of in-person case conferences with a compassionate and entertaining teaching style, plus advantages of the podcasting medium — democratizing morning report for listeners around the world.
Highlights
Despite its long-established importance, diagnostic reasoning (DR) education has suffered uneven implementation in medical education
CPSolvers has been perceived as a highly effective and novel way to disseminate DR education in the form of case conferences, serving as an alternative to traditional in-person case conferences suspended during COVID-19
This study aimed to examine podcasting as a novel way to disseminate DR education in the form of case conferences by evaluating concordance between the developers’ goals and expectations of the podcast, compared to the listeners’ actual usage habits, features they valued, and perceptions of the podcast
Summary
Despite its long-established importance, diagnostic reasoning (DR) education has suffered uneven implementation in medical education. The Clinical Problem Solvers (CPSolvers) podcast has emerged as a novel strategy to help teach DR through case conferences with expert diagnosticians and trainees. Methods: We conducted semi-structured interviews with 3 developers and 8 listeners from April–May 2020, followed by qualitative thematic analysis. To help decrease diagnostic errors, the National Academies of Sciences issued a report that urged educators to improve clinical reasoning (CR) [2]. Despite its acknowledged importance, structured curricula for CR have suffered uneven implementation, with 57% of institutions in a national survey lacking such curricula [4]. The majority of CR education was provided during attending rounds (69%) or morning report (60%)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
