Connect or detach: A transformative experience for medical students in end-of-life care.

Context: At the beginning of clinical practice, medical students face complex end-of-life (EoL) decisions, such as limiting life-sustaining therapies, which may precipitate emotionally charged moral dilemmas. Previous research shows these dilemmas may cause identity dissonance and impact students' personal and professional development. Despite the prevalence of such dilemmas, medical educators have limited insight into how students navigate these often emotional experiences.

Position statement of the Brazilian Palliative Care Academy on withdrawing and withholding life-sustaining interventions in the context of palliative care.

The issue of withrawing and withholding life-sustaining interventions is an important source of controversy among healthcare professionals caring for patients with serious illnesses. Misguided decisions, both in terms of the introduction/maintenance and the withdrawal/withholding of these measures, represent a source of avoidable suffering for patients, their loved ones, and healthcare professionals. This document represents the position statement of the Bioethics Committee of the Brazilian Palliative Care Academy on this issue and establishes seven principles to guide, from a bioethical perspective, the approach to situations related to this topic in the context of palliative care in Brazil.

"Every day that I stay at home, it's another day blaming myself for not being at #Frontline"-Understanding medical students' sacrifices during COVID-19 Pandemic.

COVID-19 struck the world and stretched the healthcare system and professionals. Medical students engaged in the pandemic effort, making personal and professional sacrifices. However, the impact of these sacrifices on students` professional development is still unknown.

Palliative care in emergency care: invoking Kairos and rethinking health care systems.

Acute crises of decompensation of a chronic disease are, in most cases, handled in an Emergency Room setting. In these services, emergency care professionals face several challenges, such as incomplete information on the patient's disease, scarce resources, and the pressure of having to make decisions in a short time. In this context, what can be done to provide patient-centered care that is at the same time technically appropriate and aligned with their values? Understanding the patient's situation in relation to their disease; talking to the patient about their clinical condition, comprehending their values and feelings; and understanding time as Kairos - that is, the time of the consultation as an opportunity to understand the patient's needs and build a shared therapeutic plan - are possible solutions to this challenge.

Social justice in medical education: inclusion is not enough-it's just the first step.

Introduction: Medical schools worldwide are creating inclusion policies to increase the admission of students from vulnerable social groups. This study explores how medical students from vulnerable social groups experience belongingness as they join the medical community.

Methods: This qualitative study applied thematic analysis to 10 interviews with medical students admitted to one medical school through an affirmative policy.

'I found myself a despicable being!': Medical students face disturbing moral dilemmas.

Context: The psychological realm of medical students' moral experiences is explored tangentially in medical education literature, often in the context of ethics or professionalism education. This study deepens our understanding by (a) investigating the nature of moral dilemmas experienced at the onset of clinical practice, (b) exploring students' emotional response to these dilemmas, and (c) examining how students perceive the influence of these dilemmas on their professional development.

Methods: This is a cross-sectional qualitative study carried out in 2017 that applied thematic template analysis to individual interviews performed with last-year medical students.

Nurturing virtues of the medical profession: does it enhance medical students' empathy?

Objectives: To examine if the empathy levels of first-year medical students are amenable to didactic interventions idealized to promote values inherent to medical professional identity.

Methods: This is a pretest-posttest study designed to assess the empathy levels of first-year medical students (n=166) comprising two consecutive classes of a Brazilian medical school, performed before and after a didactic intervention. Students attended a course based on values and virtues related to medical professional identity once a week over four months.

Left Ventricle Tissue Doppler Imaging Predicts Disease Severity in Septic Patients Newly Admitted in an Emergency Unit.

Background: Assessment of sepsis severity is challenging. Available scoring systems require laboratory data. Therefore, a rapid tool would be useful.