To the Editor:
Like most family medicine residency programs, we have been conducting some form of article review for quite a while. At the Medical College of Georgia Department of Family Medicine, we have been reviewing articles with levels of organization ranging from informal presentations to more developed journal club (JC) presentations and discussions for at least 15 years. In September 1997, the Journal changed the name of its research reviews from “Journal Club” to Patient-Oriented Evidence that Matters (POEMs), and in September 1998 we began using reviews in that form in our monthly JC.
Each monthly JC/POEMs discussion has raised questions about bits of information (statistics, research design, assessment methodology, new terms, and so forth) that some valiant soul attempted to address in the discussion, often with more heat than light. We felt we were losing some of the valuable teachable moments and thought we could recapture some of those by writing a postmortem after each JC meeting. Its goal was to answer some of the niggling questions raised during the monthly presentation and discussion of POEMs. The result: a 1-page follow-up to each JC that attempts to explain, in a simple way, some of the technical bits and pieces people were wondering about. Playing off the POEMs acronym, we named this 1-sheet monthly publication “SONNETS” (Simple Or Not so simple Needed Explanations of Technical Stuff). As the name implies, we designed it to be an easy-to-read, informative, and brief method of capitalizing on the curiosity piqued by something in JC.
Response from the family medicine faculty and residents has been positive. This notable example came from one of our young new faculty members following a recent edition: “This is great work! I hope that everyone reads this when they get back in from the holidays. It is concise, easy to read and, I think, useful. It is a great follow up to journal club. Keep up this effort.”
Michael M. Grant, MA
Peggy J. Wagner, PhD
Medical College of Georgia Augusta