Volume 103, Issue 3

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists clinical indicator for unplanned return to the operating room during the same admission in an obstetrics and gynecology residency is reviewed in this article. A retrospective chart review of all gynecologic surgeries during a 3-year period was evaluated for this indicator. An incidence of 0.03% was noted, with 3 of 1,492 procedures meeting the definition of this indicator. The incidence of this clinical indicator is uncommon in a community hospital-based obstetrics and gynecology residency.

By using specific key words, clinicians can use an Internet database service to identify federally funded grant and scholarship opportunities--opportunities more frequently sought by basic scientists. The authors hypothesized that such an Internet service could be used as a research tool to examine and compare the clinical research preferences of potential medical and bioscience investigators. The authors selected 577 key words from an online key word thesaurus used by both the federal government and ScienceWise.com. These key words formed a survey instrument to measure the research interests of 40 family medicine academic faculty members of a college of osteopathic medicine. The findings were compared to a survey by ScienceWise.com of its 102,578 subscribers and to previous surveys of nonacademic clinicians. Results indicate an efficient means of determining research interests as well as a method of alerting academic clinicians/nonclinicians and basic scientists to current funding opportunities.

The term bibliotherapy has been defined by Russell and Shrodes as "a process of dynamic interaction between the personality of the reader and literature--an interaction which may be used for personality assessment, adjustment, and growth." In the clinical setting, the dynamics that promote change in a patient-reader can include identification, projection, introjection, catharsis, and insight. Clinicians may use bibliotherapy as a tool for patient treatment, medical diagnosis, and the prevention of illness related to psychosocial dysfunction, allowing for gradual and mutual insight into patient complaints over time. Bibliotherapy may display efficacy on intellectual, psychosocial, interpersonal, emotional, and behavioral levels. The author identifies two basic types of resources that are useful to clinicians administering bibliotherapy: didactic texts, which are instructive, and imaginative literature, which can be a literary text, biography, or autobiography and fosters an imaginative response from the patient-reader. The author identifies the advantages and risks of using bibliotherapy and explores its possible applications in osteopathic medical education, encouraging osteopathic medical educators to familiarize themselves with this treatment modality.