Teaching of chest radiology to medical students.

The method of teaching chest roentgenobogy to medical students at the University of Oregon Medical School is based upon the premise that useful knowledge cannot be attained without practical experience. In a medical school, brilliant teachers cannot serve in lieu of actual patients. Lectures, though superbly organized, illustrated and delivered do not constitute an adequate substitute for realistic clinical experience, no matter the student enthusiasm engendered. X-ray films comprise the bulk of the actual working material of the radiologist insofar as chest disease is concerned.t If for no other reason, this is fortunate for teaching purposes since, unlike the patient, .radiographs are easily carried home for study by the student. They can be duplicated at will and each copy retains the reality of the original clinical problem. To fail to exploit this advantage is to do injustice to both the student and academic radiology. Classes at the University of Oregon Medical School are composed of approximately 70 students. The course in diagnostic radiology is given at the third year level and consists of 33 hour long exercises at weekly intervals. Eleven weeks are devoted to radiology of the chest. In three introductory lectures, an attempt is made to present to the student a threedimensional concept of the chest as it is reconstructed on two-dimensional x-ray films. Following these lectures, students are assigned cases from the departmental teaching file. These carefully selected cases are prepared as they might appear awaiting routine dictation in a radiology department or radiologist’s office. A requisition containing clinical data is supplied with the films. In the interest of reality, the clinical information on this requisition varies markedly in quantity and quality. Generally, it is determined by the radiographic findings. Students are allowed to keep the films in their possession for one week. Thereafter and at seven weekly intervals, sessions are held in six small groups, each of which meets with a faculty radiologist. Students, cases and instructors rotate each week. Cases are assigned to the students in bright blue envelopes, a maneuver in the interest of departmental advertising which has to this date not been branded unethical (although the medical school orthopedists are rumored to be