Core lecture Series (6-8 hours per month)
The Core Lecture Series (.xls) consists of 1-hour sessions organized in cohorts around specific urologic domains. The session is structured as a lecture/discussion by an assigned teaching faculty member with the active involvement of all residents. Specific textbook and other literature is assigned for each session. The residents’ knowledge of the assigned material is assessed following each session (see evaluation included in Appendix G). The residents are required to direct this conference on three occasions in a 2-year cycle.  This conference is structured to provide the residents with an in-depth fund of knowledge of established urologic information in order to prepare them for their in-service and written board examinations.
  
Quality Improvement (1 hour per month)
This conference is designed as a Quality Improvement/Quality Assurance activity. The structure is case oriented with each resident presenting the pertinent clinical information. The residents and faculty of the Department collect and report information on every adverse event/medical error that occurs on the clinical service. The residents are responsible for identifying the adverse events on the inpatient service while faculty report such events from the outpatient setting. The focus of this effort and conference is to collect data regarding adverse events associated with all urologic interventions and to develop improvement programs to reduce these events. The Quality Improvement Conference Form can be found in Appendix G.
  
MEND Lecture (1 hour per month)
The Mowad Endowment for New Discoveries (MEND) Lecture series is designed to provide current medical scientific information, as well as potential new directions for clinical care to the resident and faculty audience. This series has been developed to discuss the process of innovation and creativity and to develop skills within the individual urology resident. The lecture showcases new developments within the field of urology with emphasis on their application in the clinical urology setting. The format is also didactic, but lends itself nicely to the discussion and free exchange of ideas. Each resident is responsible to introduce a new discovery at one MEND lecture each year.
  
Journal Club (2 hours per month)
A monthly Journal Club is held in the urology conference room where faculty and residents analyze a series of current publications from all Journals that pertain to clinical urology. The Chief resident generally chooses the articles for analysis with advice from the faculty. Individual residents are assigned an article for presentation. The resident is expected to review the scientific design, research hypothesis, study population, study data, statistical analysis and appropriateness of conclusions. The faculty contribute to this analysis and stimulate an active discussion about each publication. The residents’ performance during Journal Club is assessed by the faculty using a specific evaluation form (see evaluation included in Appendix G).
 
General Competency Conference  (1.5-3 hours per month)
The Program Director, and other teaching faculty, meets with the residents regularly as part of the ongoing focus on the six general competencies. This conference is directed towards the development of interpersonal skills, communication, professionalism, medical ethics, practice based and system based learning. The conference is designed to be flexible in order to maximize the opportunity for exploring these more fluid topics. In particular, each resident completes a self-assessment form at the start of each conference. These very honest resident analyses often serve as the subject for a later session. These General Competency Conference Forms can be found in Appendix I.

Topics for these sessions have included role-playing exercises to examine approaches for interactions with difficult patients, challenging families and consulting physicians. Additionally, role-playing exercises have been employed to discuss medical ethics questions surrounding end of life care. Other sessions have focused on the medical chart documentation, challenging resident-to-resident interactions, the use of the EMR, costs of medical resources and structured patient interview

The general competencies are typically also addressed throughout the other described conferences, but this conference is time is specifically reserved for this purpose.  The residents and attending staff fill out core competency self-evaluation forms at the end of this conference for collation and record keeping. The typical structure is 1-2 faculty members meeting with the residents for each 90-minute block.
         
Pathology Conference (1 hour per month)
This conference is structured as both a case specific and organ specific review of pathologic specimens. This includes gross and microscopic review of representative tissue slides as well as a broad review of disease specific pathology.
   
Multi-disciplinary Cancer Conference (MDC) (1 hour per month)
The MDC conference is a multi-disciplinary uro-oncology conference directed by the faculty leadership in Urologic Oncology. The conference is case based and serves as a working conference designed to determine the course of treatment for patients with urologic cancers. Additionally, the conference is designed to discuss the development of oncology protocols for both routine clinical care and investigational directions. Pertinent x-rays and pathology slides are reviewed. This conference is generally attended by representatives from the departments of urology, radiology, oncology, radiation oncology and pathology.  All of the urology residents attend this conference and provide relevant patient presentations. The more senior residents participate in the development of treatment plans.  

Transplant Conference (1 hour every other month)
This conference is designed to expose the residents to evaluation and management of renal and pancreatic transplant patients, including surgical aspects of donor organ harvesting, urologic issues of the transplant procedure, the evaluation of the potential donor and recipient, and immunosupression. This conference is typically structured similarly to a Journal Club. There will be some didactic structure to this conference with assigned readings.

Geriatric Conference (1 hour every other month)
This conference is designed to expose the residents to evaluation and management of geriatric patients, including surgical aspects of the aging population, and urologic issues of the elderly patients. This conference is typically structured similarly to a Journal Club. There will be some didactic structure to this conference with assigned readings.

Imaging QI Conference (1 hour per month)
The residents are required to attend the Imaging QI conference on a monthly basis. The conference is held in the urology conference room and is attended by urology teaching faculty and urology residents.  At this conference, various radiologic modalities are explored and specific tests are scrutinized. At these conferences, rationale behind utilizing various radiologic modalities is explored, specific patients are discussed, and the cost impact on the patient is reviewed. The structure is case-oriented with residents presenting pertinent clinical information.

Basic Science (1 hour per month)
The residents attend a monthly basic science conference. There is a required article selected by the leader of this conference. Residents are expected to have read the article and be capable of intelligently discussing it. The focus of this conference is molecular biology, research techniques, and statistical analysis.