One day I decided to start rounds by discussing current events. Some of my former college and business school professors had started their lectures in this manner, and I thought it would be a thought-provoking opening to rounds. After all, my team was bright, enthusiastic, and certainly not afraid to voice their opinions, especially when it came to my choice of neckties. But even though I chose a health-care-relevant topic that had been plastered across the news over the past week, no one had heard or read about it.
“If World War III were happening right now, the only way I’d know is if someone paged me about it or if it somehow had started in the ICU,” one intern joked. Of course, we realized that she was kidding, since the hospital cafeteria cappuccino line would have been a much more likely place for a conflict to start. However, her response crystallized what I have found: many medical students and physicians-in-training are poorly informed about current events, even those events that affect health care, medicine, and physicians.
Talking to my team further revealed that the problem was not a lack of interest. “It’s embarrassing,” said one of the interns about his currents events knowledge. The intern explained that with limited time outside the hospital, keeping up with current events falls on the priority list behind sleeping, eating, making sure you have clean underwear, spending time with the significant other, and learning medicine, though not necessarily in that order. Even when the medical students and the housestaff have time to watch television or read nonmedical material, they usually opt for “fluffy, brainless” stuff like movies, entertainment news, reality shows, sitcoms, or sports, because they need time to “veg out” and relax from poring over textbooks and patient charts. One of the interns falls asleep every time he has to read something that requires thought and explained that he had slept on top of some fantastic books over the past year.
So it appears that fatigue and lack of time are the obstacles. All agreed that staying aware of current events would help them better understand their future practice environments and make them more likely to get involved in health care policy issues. Current events also frequently come up during conversations with patients, at cocktail parties, and, as one of my medical students lamented, during dates. Unless future physicians understand the current events related to health care, they may not be adequately equipped to have a voice when important health care policy changes, issues, and debates occur.
So whenever possible, discuss current events. Use it as a way to open medical lectures or rounds. Perhaps schedule teaching sessions specifically dedicated to important current events. Those of us who actually have the time and energy to read the newspapers and stay current can serve as the conduits. You may succeed in getting students and trainees into the habit of staying informed, which will undoubtedly benefit our profession in the future.
Bruce Y. Lee, MD, MBA
