key: cord-0026192-xvw0hwkv authors: Van Kampen, Kaitlyn; Collison, Maggie; Arora, Vineet title: COVID-19 Educational Support Team: Librarians, Physicians, and Medical Students Collaborate to Synthesize COVID-19 Research for Clinicians date: 2022-01-26 journal: Acad Med DOI: 10.1097/acm.0000000000004483 sha: 0ec94cac35edd7e63a0c6f8a7725f5a761e07fa2 doc_id: 26192 cord_uid: xvw0hwkv nan feel more comfortable asking peers basic questions (e.g., how to format a manuscript) compared with asking residents or faculty members, whom they might perceive as less accessible or unapproachable. 1 Peer mentors are less removed from the specific challenges faced by medical student researchers (e.g., balancing research with coursework) than are faculty, and therefore may provide more targeted advice. While it is certainly important for medical students to build relationships with faculty, supplementing traditional mentor-mentee relationships with horizontal mentorship will provide benefits. Pathways for implementing horizontal mentorship networks include creating student-led research electives for teaching fundamentals of biostatistics/ experimental design, connecting students with peer mentors through specialty interest groups, and engaging in interdisciplinary collaborations with fellow medical students at the home institution or other institutions. Although a large proportion of medical students are interested in research, practical difficulties (e.g., lack of opportunities, absence of well-structured research governance) often impede students from making meaningful progress. 1 Medical schools and their students alike should engage in the creation of horizontal mentorship networks to allow aspiring medical student researchers to achieve their full potential. The Need to Expand Peer-to-Peer Tutoring Programs and Promote Them Online to Every Medical Student To the Editor: Peer-to-peer tutoring benefits all involved parties in medical education. Learners attain study skills and medical knowledge, while tutors refamiliarize themselves with study material and improve their pedagogic skills. 1 As a result, peer-to-peer tutoring decreases student failure rates 2 and fosters a sense of community. 1 Given these benefits, we believe a peer-to-peer tutoring program is an integral part of medical education that should be explicitly promoted online to every student. In 2020, we conducted an online search for peer tutoring programs at the 151 U.S.-based medical schools that were then members of the Association of American Medical Colleges. For each school, we examined the first page of a Google search for the terms "tutor" or "tutoring" or "peer tutor" or "peer tutoring. " We were able to identity 97 (64.2%) schools with programs that explicitly mentioned a medical student peer-to-peer tutoring service on the first Google page. Of these institutions, 75 (82.4%) provided clear instructions on how to access those services by asking for a contact name and/or email address and an office address and offered a tutor request form or a referral to the school's Canvas page. Seven programs promoted their peer-to-peer tutor programs solely through their online student handbooks. In our search, we often found for-profit tutoring agencies listed above the medical institution's website. The results of our research suggest that many schools either do not adequately communicate their peer tutor services online or lack a peer-to-peer tutoring service entirely. We hope that these findings will encourage schools that lack a peer-to-peer tutoring service to establish one and will encourage schools that now offer such a service to improve how they promote it online. Because the school website or academic handbook may be the first point of contact for students, we believe it is essential to provide detailed online instructions on how to obtain the school's peer-to-peer tutoring services. Funding/Support: None reported. Other disclosures: None reported. 1 We would like to describe our experience and highlight additional opportunities for similar services to provide VAME in academic settings and clinical systems beyond individual patient management. The UChicago COVID-19 Educational Support Team was developed when our clinical librarians began providing resources and answers to clinical queries for clinicians in our COVID-19 unit. Four fourth-year medical students and an intern were recruited to assist, along with a fellow and faculty sponsor. From the initial teams' work, an elective was formed, and 10 more students were recruited to handle the increasing demand. The team created 80 syntheses and summarized 325 significant articles. Survey results of clinicians showed 78% reported a change in thinking due to the syntheses, and 100% requested continuation of the service postpandemic. After the elective, the team recruited 2 additional students to create infographics that synthesized vaccine information. In addition to the benefits described in the article by Zhou and colleagues, our VAME initiative reached beyond individual patient care. Clinicians asked questions and used the syntheses for presentations, research, and international meetings with Wuhan University (located where the COVID-19 virus originated in Wuhan, China). We received queries from nursing staff, physicians, and advanced practice providers, which ranged from topics on individual patient management in the hospital to community transmission and long-term sequelae. Prior publications have highlighted the importance of integrating medical education into the broader clinical system. 2, 3 The services provided by students within this team demonstrate their potential for contributions across the health care system. Creating formal electives and strong partnerships across care systems and the community is an important component of ongoing medical education. This empowers students to be active members throughout the hospital and community and encourages multidisciplinary teamwork in libraries, public health labs, and more to improve delivery of care. To the Editor: The value of medical student ideas has risen to the forefront as they play larger roles within academic medicine. 1 Although we are encouraged by recent efforts by medical journals, such as Academic Medicine, to include medical students on editorial boards, this remains an underrecognized area for involvement. We present a medical student perspective on the rationale for involving medical students on editorial boards and pathways to incorporate students. Medical students display diligence, enthusiasm, and novel perspectives due to their diverse backgrounds and experiences, willingness to question longstanding assumptions, and technological proficiency. 1 These characteristics enable them to make valuable contributions and work collaboratively with other board members through 5 prospective ways: (1) join social media teams to expand the journal reach and readership; (2) function as managing editors or assistants to the editor-in-chief to gain appreciation for daily journal operations; (3) coordinate student columns to increase representation of student perspectives in published literature, 1 specialty outreach programs, or special issues of importance; (4) serve as liaisons to professional organizations to promote subspecialty cohesiveness; or (5) review topical manuscripts that match their knowledge level. Medical student involvement in editorial boards has numerous benefits. Incorporating students will reduce disparities in recruitment to medicine and subspecialties by empowering underrepresented voices and providing opportunities for mentorship, scholarship, and networking for underrepresented groups. 2 Medical students will also infuse new ideas into journal editorial boards while promoting their professional identity formation through career exploration and increased research productivity. 3 This will enable continued participation in the editorial process after medical school, creating a generation of dedicated academic physicians. 2 It is time to increase representation of medical students' perspectives in opinion articles A proposal for medical student inclusion on the editorial boards of neurosurgical journals Impact of mentoring medical students on scholarly productivity Acknowledgments: The author thanks Benjamin Gallo Marin for providing input and also thanks the other incredible peer mentors from whom he has learned and with whom he has collaborated.Funding/Support: None reported.Other disclosures: None reported.Ethical approval: Reported as not applicable. Third-year medical student, Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, Cleveland, Ohio; dxz281@case.edu; Twitter: @davidxzheng.Acknowledgments: The team would like to thank Debra Werner and the medical trainees who served on the team. The team would also like to acknowledge the support of Chief Medical Officer Dr. Stephen Weber, the Hospital Incident Command System leadership, and the UChicago Medicine clinical staff serving on the frontlines. The team would also like to acknowledge the support of The Kathleen and Howard Zar Science Library Fund for funding the Kathleen A. Zar Clinical Library Residency position. The authors thank their mentors for their guidance and support. Other disclosures: None reported.Ethical approval: Reported as not applicable.