Daily Duties and Responsibilities

Based on their level of training, residents are provided increasing autonomy with close faculty supervision. The residents have the responsibility of grossing the specimens, which come into the laboratory on their designated days. This includes the dictation of the clinical history, gross features of the specimen, and the appropriate sampling of any lesions. The residents also participate in any special procedures performed at this time, such as gross photography, sampling of tissue for electron microscopy, cell surface markers, cytogenetics, and tissue banking.

On the subsequent day, the residents are required to review the microscopic findings of each specimen grossed. Residents are expected to preview as many of their cases as possible prior to signing them out with faculty in concordance with their level of training. With faculty guidance, residents are responsible for deciding what additional ancillary studies may be necessary in order to complete each case.

Each resident will be graded as to “agree, partially agree, or disagree” for each microscopic diagnosis and gross description/dissection. The resident will receive a written evaluation with summary statistics for him/herself compared to the overall resident mean. In addition to feedback provided at the time their cases are signed out, the resident can review selected cases in which he/she had a discrepancy with the faculty pathologist by requesting a print-out of such cases from Mr. Ed Gray, the informational technology specialist for Co-Path. The number of cases previewed independently and the accuracy of both gross descriptions and microscopic diagnoses as measured by percentage agreement and the rotation evaluation are expected to increase with increasing resident seniority.

Fellows follow basically the same schedule as residents; however, they are also expected to assist in teaching more junior residents in the Gross Room. In addition, fellows may preview their cases and hand these to the supervising faculty when completely worked up. While they do not need to review each case directly with the attending faculty, they are expected to review all cases for which they have questions. Fellows will be expected to function with minimal discrepancies with the faculty.