Just Do It: Participation in Structured Online Curricula Reliably Improves Low ABSITE Scores

Samantha Tarras; Michael T White; Katelyn Toloff; Dana Cooley; David Edelman

doi:10.1016/j.jsurg.2022.07.011

Just Do It: Participation in Structured Online Curricula Reliably Improves Low ABSITE Scores

J Surg Educ. 2022 Nov-Dec;79(6):e166-e172. doi: 10.1016/j.jsurg.2022.07.011. Epub 2022 Jul 25.

Authors

Samantha Tarras¹, Michael T White², Katelyn Toloff², Dana Cooley², David Edelman²

Affiliations

¹ The Michael and Marian Ilitch Department of Surgery, Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan. Electronic address: starras@med.wayne.edu.
² The Michael and Marian Ilitch Department of Surgery, Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan.

PMID: 35902350
DOI: 10.1016/j.jsurg.2022.07.011

Abstract

Objective: We hypothesized residents enrolled in an Accelerated Clinical Education in Surgery (ACES) program would improve their scores to above the 30^th percentile. We analyzed which components of ACES correlated with improvement.

Design and setting: A retrospective review of three academic cycles (2018-2021) at an academic general surgery residency.

Participants: Residents scoring ≤30^th percentile on the ABSITE were enrolled in ACES. Baseline demographics including STEP scores were collected. ACES included: (1) SCORE and DeckerMed assignments (2) Weekly faculty review sessions and (3) Monthly meeting with assigned mentor. Data were analyzed by Student's t-test, one-way ANOVA and Fisher's exact test.

Results: Twenty-six surgical residents enrolled in ACES. Compared to residents not in ACES, there was no significant difference females (15 vs. 15; p = 0.19) and STEP 2 scores (241 vs. 246; p = 0.06). Residents in ACES had significantly lower STEP 1 (225 vs. 237; p < 0.001) and STEP 3 (212 vs. 223; p < 0.001) scores. Demographics of ACES residents who subsequently scored >30^th percentile were similar to those who didn't, except for STEP 3 scores (216 vs. 204; p = 0.008). For residents in ACES, the completion of assignments between July and January was significantly higher for those who subsequently achieved an ABSITE score >30^th percentile: TWIS, 77% vs. 53% (p = 0.022), Decker WC, 80% vs. 49% (p = 0.009) and Decker MR, 53% vs. 29% (p = 0.016). Completion of an online practice exam prior to ABSITE also correlated with score >30^th percentile (57% vs. 13%, p = 0.007). There was also no correlation between the number of faculty review sessions and ABSITE (11.5 vs.11.9, p = 0.931).

Conclusions: Participation in a structured online program of reading and quizzes was durably effective in improving ABSITE scores >30^th percentile. Completion of online assignments, rather than scores on practice tests or review sessions, appeared to be the most important factor for success.

Keywords: ABSITE; Remediation Program; Surgery Residency Education.

MeSH terms

Curriculum*
Educational Status
Female
Humans
Internship and Residency*
Retrospective Studies