Tufts First Year Medical Student's Dermatopathology Elective

Preceptor: Artur Zembowicz, M.D., Ph.D.

Students: Neal Kumar, Erika Brewer, Svetlana Faktorovich, Catherine Buzney

Location: Department of Pathology, Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates
130 Brookline Ave, Boston, MA 02115 and Lahey Clinic, Burlington, MA 08103

Description:
This selective is designed for students interested in dermatology, pathology and/or having experience or interest in internet media, programming and educational digital technologies. The students will assist Dr. Zembowicz in selecting teaching material, interesting cases and other educational content for the first dermatology/ dermatopathology wiki and social networking website www.dermpedia.org.
    The students will be able to learn how to use clinical microscope and take pictures of tissue sections. They daily goal will be to write up and illustrate one dermatological entity and post in on the website.
    The students will be required to spend their allocated elective time in Dr. Zembowicz’s office, but depending on the students’ interests, they will be able to do extra work at home during their spare time. Students will have an opportunity to participate in daily dermatopathology signout looking at cases with Dr. Zembowicz using multiheaded microscope
    Importantly, students who will develop passion for dermatology and/or pathology and the project will be encouraged to become part of Dermpedia Team and serve as editors of Dermpedia website as they go through medical school.

Goals and Objectives:
Familiarize students with pathology laboratory setting and work of a diagnostic pathologist.
Give students an opportunity to learn about the importance of tissue diagnosis and clinicopathological correlation in medicine
Familiarize students with selected dermatological disease
Encourage interest in pathology and dermatology as a career
Help students build CV to compete for increasingly competitive residency programs in dermatology and pathology

Learn about the state of the art and future of on-line teaching and telemedicine
1.    To learn how to use clinical microscope.
2.    To learn how to take microscopic pictures.
3.    To learn clinical and microscopic features of common dermatological diseases and tumors
4.    To appreciate importance of clinicopathological correlation in dermatology
5.    To learn the use of internet technologies in dermatology education

Contributor(s):

Neal Kumar

Erika M Brewer

Artur Zembowicz M.D. Ph.D.

Catherine Buzney Ms.

Cases associated with this conference:

Lichen planopilaris
Author: Neal Kumar