Teaching scripts via smartphone app facilitate resident-led teaching of medical students.

Background: Previous studies have suggested that resident physicians are the most meaningful teachers during the clinical clerkships of third-year medical students (MS3s). Unfortunately, residents often feel unprepared for this crucial role. The pediatrics clerkship at our institution identified a paucity in the frequency of resident-led teaching with MS3s.

Successful implementation of a referral-based academic pediatric hospitalist service.

Objective: St Louis Children's Hospital (SLCH) developed Service for Hospital Admissions by Referring Physicians (SHARP) in January 2008 as an inpatient referral service for pediatricians who previously admitted their own patients. We hypothesized that use of SHARP would make hospitalization more efficient and cost-effective compared with the general pediatric medicine (GM) service.

Methods: Admission volumes, diagnoses, length of stay (LOS), costs, and physician billing data were abstracted from SLCH information systems and the Pediatric Health Information System database.