Department-wide Educational Conferences are held weekly, with a rotation of Surgical Skills Lab, Morbidity & Mortality Conference (closed meeting), Grand Rounds and Specialty Journal Club. In months with five Thursdays, the fifth week is dedicated to a review of resident research projects, unless otherwise specified.

Faculty and resident attendance at Education Conferences is mandatory. Conferences begin promptly at 6:30 AM, except for Grand Rounds, which begins at 7:00 AM.

Morbidity & Mortality Conference

The Morbidity & Mortality Conference takes place on the fourth Thursday of each month. All complications from all clinical services of the faculty are reviewed. Cases from each service are presented by the chief resident on that service, along with a pertinent analysis of the complication and recommendations for improvement in care. The total number of elective and emergent admissions and the total number of ambulatory and inpatient operations are presented as a framework for discussion. For each patient who is presented, a Morbidity & Mortality form must be filled out and electronically submitted to the Chairman and Residency Program Director no later than close of business the day before the presentation.

Grand Rounds

Grand Rounds are held on the third Thursday of each month. Attendance is mandatory. Organization of these sessions and invitation of visiting speakers are the direct responsibilities of the academic chief resident. After each Grand Rounds lecture, the residents present cases to the visiting speaker for 1 hour. Each case should be reviewed with the appropriate faculty member before being presented to the grand rounds speaker.

Specialty Journal Club

The Specialty Journal Club meets on the second Thursday of each month. One journal article (non-review) must be provided to the program coordinator for distribution to the residents and faculty. This should ideally be submitted no less than 1 week before the conference.