Teaching Our Residents by Playing "Surgical Jeopardy" | Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University

Stony Brook Surgery Residents Are 2014 State "Surgical Jeopardy" Champions

Our surgical residents and surgical faculty faced off in our first annual “Surgical Jeopardy” game in 2008. This activity is modeled in format after the popular TV show and in content by a game created by the <a href="http://www.facs.org/" target="_blank">American College of Surgeons</a> (ACS) to test and increase surgeons' knowledge.

Be it questions on "All the World’s a Stage" (tumor staging), "Tons of Fun" (bariatric surgery), or "Odds and Ends" (colorectal surgery), the competition was intense. The team of faculty members won the game in a close match.

<DIV><A href="/sdmpubfiles/SURGICAL-JEOPARDY-large.jpg" rel="lightbox[group1][Surgical Jeopardy]"><IMG class=imagecache-500 title="Surgical Jeopardy" alt="Surgical Jeopardy" src="/sdmpubfiles/SURGICAL-JEOPARDY.%252325.jpg"></A> 
<DIV class=caption>Our faculty team (threesome at left) competing against teams of our residents.</DIV>
</DIV>

Our Jeopardy game encourages studying by adding some excitement to the undertaking, and highlights the importance of surgical knowledge.

In an age where technical advancements are constantly improving surgical techniques, knowledge is paramount for performing surgery.

Richard J. Scriven, MD, associate professor of surgery and director of residency training in general surgery, served as the judge.

In total, five teams competed. In “round one,” three teams of residents played against each other for a spot in Final Jeopardy.

The winning resident team was then pitted against an “all-star” team (residents selected based on their board exam scores) and the faculty team consisting of William P. Reed, Jr., MD, professor of surgery, Joseph J. Sorrento, Jr., MD, associate professor of surgery, and Marc J. Shapiro, MD, professor of surgery and anesthesiology.

The faculty team was victorious in the Final Jeopardy round. The winners graciously donated their prizes — a free trip to a professional surgical meeting anywhere in the country — to the resident winners, Michael Sleet, MD, Dhaval Patel, MD, and Emily Wood, MD.

As of 2014, the ACS has held Surgical Jeopardy at its Annual Clinical Congress for over a decade. The game tests general and specialty surgery knowledge of residents around the country, and has been a great success. Several ACS chapters now include Jeopardy as part of their annual continuing education meetings.

<div class="subhead">Stony Brook Surgery Residents NY State Surgical Jeopardy Champions</div>

On May 18, 2014, our resident Jeopardy team — William Gioia, DO (PGY-2), and Brett Phillips, MD (PGY-5) — won first place in the Second Annual Resident Jeopardy Competition sponsored by the New York Chapter of the American College of Surgeons.

This is the first year we entered the statewide competition. Harlem Hospital's team were the reigning champs, and we beat them in the first round. We played Lenox Hill in the final round and won on the final jeopardy question.

The final question was: What is the anatomical landmark for an unsuccessful complete vagotomy? And the winning response: What is the <a href="http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Criminal+Nerve+of+Grass…; target="_blank">"criminal" nerve of Grassi</a>?

The competition took place at Albany Medical Center in Albany, NY. Each Jeopardy team consisted of two residents; one PGY-1or -2 and one PGY-3, -4 or -5. First-place winners won $1000 to split, and second-place won $500 to split.

See "<a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22483133" target="_blank">Gaming Used as an Informal Instructional Technique</a>," Journal of Surgical Education (2012), for evaluation of gaming strategies on learner engagement and outcomes.