There are many variations of anatomy courses taught in accredited physician assistant (PA) programs in the United States. Course directors and program leadership must choose how to effectively deliver content within their program constraints. Our anatomy course has faced challenges related to instructional time for didactic and laboratory sessions, course length, curricular placement and alignment, assessments, and faculty availability.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAltmetrics are non-traditional metrics that can capture downloads, social media shares, and other modern measures of research impact and reach. Despite most of the altmetrics literature focusing on evaluating the relationship between research outputs and academic impact/influence, the perceived and actual value of altmetrics among academicians remains nebulous and inconsistent. This work proposes that ambiguities surrounding the value and use of altmetrics may be explained by a multiplicity of altmetrics definitions communicated by journal publishers.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCoronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) created unparalleled challenges to anatomy education. Gross anatomy education has been particularly impacted given the traditional in-person format of didactic instruction and/or laboratory component(s). To assess the changes in gross anatomy lecture and laboratory instruction, assessment, and teaching resources utilized as a result of Covid-19, a survey was distributed to gross anatomy educators through professional associations and listservs.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFGiven the growing number of medical science educators, an examination of institutions' promotion criteria related to educational excellence and scholarship is timely. This study investigates the extent to which medical schools' promotion criteria align with published standards for documenting and evaluating educational activities. This document analysis systematically analyzed promotion and tenure (P&T) guidelines from U.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWhile prior meta-analyses in anatomy education have explored the effects of laboratory pedagogies and histology media on learner performance, the effects of student-centered learning (SCL) and computer-aided instruction (CAI) have not been broadly evaluated. This research sought to answer the question, "How effective are student-centered pedagogies and CAI at increasing student knowledge gains in anatomy compared to traditional didactic approaches?" Relevant studies published within the past 51 years were searched using five databases. Predetermined eligibility criteria were applied to the screening of titles and abstracts to discern their appropriateness for study inclusion.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjectives: Sexual dimorphism in the human bony pelvis is commonly assumed to be related to the intensity of obstetrical selective pressures. With intense obstetrical selective pressures, there should be greater shape dimorphism; with minimal obstetrical selective pressures, there should be reduced shape dimorphism. This pattern is seen in the nondimorphic anterior spaces and highly dimorphic posterior spaces.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSurgical anatomy is taught early in medical school training. The literature shows that many physicians, especially surgical specialists, think that anatomical knowledge of medical students is inadequate and nesting of anatomical sciences later in the clinical curriculum may be necessary. Quantitative data concerning this perception of an anatomical knowledge deficit are lacking, as are specifics as to what content should be reinforced.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction And Hypothesis: The objective of this study was to determine whether the three-dimensional shape of the bony pelvis differs between women with and without pelvic floor disorders (PFDs). We predict that the levator ani attachment points for the pelvic floor are further displaced from one another in affected relative to unaffected women.
Methods: Pelvic shape was quantified by collecting coordinate data from landmarks located on three-dimensional reconstructions of magnetic resonance images of 19 PFD cases and 16 matched controls.
Recent studies suggest that chromosomal rearrangements play a significant role in speciation by preventing recombination and maintaining species persistence despite interspecies gene flow. Factors conferring adaptation or reproductive isolation are maintained in rearranged regions in the face of hybridization, while such factors are eliminated from collinear regions. As a direct test of this rearrangement model, we evaluated the genetic basis of hybrid male sterility in a sympatric species pair, Drosophila pseudoobscura pseudoobscura and D.
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