Research
OPTI-West is committed to fostering, developing, conducting and maintaining the philosophy and performance of research. Research is foundation to graduate medical education and along with education is a priority for OPTI-West, GME and Program Directors. Research is a means to build all residency programs, and build a knowledge base for training students, clinicians and academia. Research involvement inspires life-long scholarship, promotes the use and critical evaluation of medical literature, develops the ability to critically evaluate clinical outcomes using scientific method, and enables physicians to translate data in the medical literature into their practices. Therefore, OPTI-West, GME and Program Directors will provide the environment and opportunity, and encourage residents to understand research methodology, comprehend medical informatics, apply study designs and statistical methods to the appraisal of clinical studies, perform self evaluation of clinical practice patterns and practice-based improvement, participate in quality improvement and quality assurance activities, develop habits of lifelong learning and scholarly pursuit within their specialty and translate Medical Research into Patient Care.
Please click on the link below to take the:
Third Annual OPTI-West Resident Research and Faculty Development Conference Survey
Getting started on research; Questions and tips (Page citations are from the Louisa Burns Research Manual – see website link; available download in .pdf format)
What kinds of projects are possible? See “Getting Started” – page 18
What assistance is available? A list of mentors is available (see link above); also see “Assistance for Physicians to Develop Clinical Research” – page 19Is funding available? Some resources are listed on page 10
What research question are you trying to answer? See page 21 doe guidance; also Form F, page 50; the Easton/McCall “Statistics Glossary” has helpful information on constructing a testable hypothesis
Is the project you are considering realistic? See Form G, pages 50-51 to help guide your thoughts
What data will you collect and how will you go about collecting it? See page 19
What literature should you review prior to designing your project? See page 16 for suggestions and links
What research design will you use to answer your question? See page 18, “Getting Started” also page 30, “Simple Clinical Research Designs”
Do you know what statistics might be required to support your data analysis? See Appendix III
Do you have a large enough participant base to get meaningful results? See Easton/McCall “Statistical Glossary” Appendix III; it might also be helpful to have a statistician help with this question.
Have you contacted a statistician? It is often helpful to talk with a statistician before finalizing your protocol, just to make sure you will generate meaningful data. For additional help, contact Dr. William Cairney at OPTI-West, wcairney@westernu.edu.
Have you created a timeline or outline to assure realistic timing to complete your research?See page 48 for a simple guide
Is there opportunity for collaboration? Contact Dr. William Cairney at OPTI-West, wcairney@westernu.edu. There may be opportunities for collaboration within the OPTI-West Practice-Based Research Network.
Recently, ARMC and PHLB held their Annual Research Day sponsored by OPTI-West. The posters demonstrate to broad diversity of interest within the institutions. Some of the posters in no specific order follow.
In addition to the above, residents and faculty are currently working on the following projects. If you are interested please contact them.
Women's Health-ARMC
Incidence of Umbilical Artery pH < 70 in Elective C/S at Term in Women Without Medical of Known Fetal Complications- Adair, Nichole
Acute Pancreatitis Complicating Pregnancy: A Six Year Institutional Experience With and Without Episiotomy- Prewitt, Lauren
Quality Improvement and Patient Safety Study of Hysterectomy at a County Institution - Galbraith, Lisa
General Surgery-ARMC
Diabetic Foot - Nina Bowman
Inguinal Hernia - Tom Walbolt
Effects of Different Pain Medicines on Trauma Patients - Ravi Shah
Indications for Biopsy in Birads 3 Breast Lesions - Jason Tomsic
Comparison of Open and Laproscopic Appendictomy - Austin Nguyen
Neurosurgery-ARMC
Intraventricular tissue plasminogen in hypertensive basal ganglia hemorrhages - Dennis Cramer
Hypertonic saline vs. mannitol in head injured patients - Jon Taveau
Vertebroplasty in acute lumbar trauma - Gaytri Sonti
Metastatic anaplastic ependymom - Dan Hutton
Timing for surgical decompression for traumatic spinal cord injury - Nicholas Qandah
Preadministration of 3% NaCl for Prophylaxic treatment of Increased intracranial pressure associated with Severe closed head injury/Intracranial Hemorrhage - Elijah Wogu
Pituitary Carcinoma - Caroline Boorman
Cervical Spondylotic Myelopathy - Ripul Panchal
Endoscopy for Tethered Cord - S. Yamada
Family Medicine-ARMC
Chronic disease (diabetes) and limb length difference - Luciano, Michael
Pediatric obesity and diabetes - Wadhwa, Gurinder
Chronic disease (diabetes) and limb length difference - Wilson, Katherine
Emergency Medicine-ARMC
Violence in the Emergency Room; a study of physical and verbal abuse experienced by emergentologist in a wide variety of emergency department settings - Snyder
Focuses patient assessment reduces need for ancillary testing in ED - Borger
Past Research Days:
Resources