The Resident Outcome Project: Increased Academic Productivity Associated with a Formal Clinical Research Curriculum.

Purpose: A formal 2-year clinical research project in conjunction with a system-based practice and practice-based learning and improvement curriculum was initiated for all residents in our program. Within the structure of this formal clinical research curriculum, residents are required to develop a research hypothesis, develop an appropriate study design, collect and analyze data, and present a completed project.

Methods: At the end of the PGY1 year, residents select a project with an emphasis on quality improvement or clinical outcomes.

The Association of Motor Skills and Adaptive Functioning in XXY/Klinefelter and XXYY Syndromes.

Klinefelter (XXY) and XXYY syndromes are genetic disorders in males characterized by additional sex chromosomes compared to the typical male karyotype of 46, XY. Both conditions have been previously associated with motor delays and motor skills deficits. We aimed to describe and compare motor skills in males with XXY and XXYY syndromes, and to analyze associations with age, cognitive abilities, and adaptive functioning.

The reflective statement: a new tool to assess resident learning.

Purpose: Continued assessment and redesign of the curriculum is essential for optimal surgical education. For the last 3 y, we have asked the residents to reflect on the previous week and describe "the best thing" they learned. We hypothesize that this statement could be used to assess the weaknesses or strengths of our curriculum.

Student outcomes in a postprofessional online master's-degree program.

The outcomes of five cohorts of occupational therapists who completed an online postprofessional master's degree program were evaluated. Data on graduates' satisfaction with professional skills and status, contribution of the program to their satisfaction, and engagement in professional activities since graduation were collected using an online survey. Forty-nine of 65 surveys distributed were returned (75% response rate).

The increase in longitudinally measured sleepiness across adolescence is related to the maturational decline in low-frequency EEG power.

Objectives: A changing sleep schedule that reduces sleep duration is thought to produce the increasing daytime sleepiness of adolescents. We tested the hypothesis that adolescent daytime sleepiness also results from adolescent brain maturational processes indexed by declining delta electroencephalographic (EEG) activity.

Design: Data are from the first 3 years of a semilongitudinal study of EEG changes in adolescence.

A time-cost analysis of teaching a laparoscopic entero-enterostomy.

Objective: Determining the success of technical skill training for surgery residents should include not only the efficacy of the training in terms of skills learned but also the cost of the facility where the training occurs and the cost of faculty participation. Traditional training occurs in the operating room, but the cost of faculty time and operating room time has not been well established. Assessing the cost of traditional training may allow us to put the cost of building and maintaining skills laboratories in perspective.

Occupational therapy outcomes for clients with traumatic brain injury and stroke using the Canadian Occupational Performance Measure.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether 155 ethnically diverse clients with traumatic brain injury (TBI) and stroke (cerebrovascular accident; CVA) who received occupational therapy services perceived that they reached self-identified goals related to tasks of daily life as measured by the Canadian Occupational Performance Measure (COPM). This study found that a statistically and clinically significant change in self-perceived performance and satisfaction with tasks of daily life occurred at the end of a client-centered occupational therapy program (p < .001).

When fieldwork takes a detour.

This study explored the experience of occupational therapists who encountered counterproductive events during their fieldwork training. Interviews were conducted to gather information regarding the participant's perception of factors that contributed to a negative fieldwork experience. The results were divided into major categories: (1) the role of the supervisor, (2) poor supervisory characteristics, (3) the fieldwork infrastructure, (4) misconceptions in the fieldwork experience, (5) student coping strategies, (6) student responses, (7) positive outcomes, (8) negative consequential outcomes, and (9) cycle of the ineffective fieldwork experience.

Student Development in an Online Post-Professional Master's Program.

SUMMARY Students' perceptions of personal and professional development in an online post-professional Master's degree program in occupational therapy were investigated. In-class postings, reflection papers, and e-mail surveys completed by 14 occupational therapists throughout the course of an online Master's program were coded and analyzed. Three themes were identified: the developmental process of post-professional education, the value of the online learning community, and the influence of positive and negative characteristics of online pedagogy in creating lifelong learners.

Visual motor skills in homeless children.

Objective: Identify the visual motor, visual perceptual and motor coordination skills of homeless pre-school and school-aged children living in an emergency shelter for homeless families.

Method: All three subtests of the Developmental Test of Visual Motor Integration-4th Edition, Revised (VMI) were administered to 33 children living in a family homeless shelter.

Results: Homeless children did not display significant deficits in visual motor, visual perceptual or motor coordination skills.

The school as social context: social interaction patterns of children with physical disabilities.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to investigate the characteristics of the school social environment experienced by children with physical disabilities and the social interactional characteristics of children with physical disabilities in the school environment. The goal was to understand the interactive processes that support or inhibit these children's social interactions.

Method: Naturalistic observation and participant interviews were used to collect data on social interaction patterns of three children with physical disabilities 5 to 8 years of age who were enrolled in age-appropriate regular education classrooms.