Getting started with taiji: investigating students expectations and teachers appraisals of taiji beginners courses

In recent years, Taiji has been frequently investigated and considered as a stress management intervention. Although health care providers' appraisals and consumers' expectations are regarded as essential for treatment outcome, little attention has been drawn to this issue in Taiji research. In our study we have conducted two surveys to explore beginners' (n = 74) expectations and teachers' (n = 136) appraisals of their Taiji courses in general as well as more particularly related to stress management. Qualitative data analysis revealed that beginners mainly expected to learn a new method that is applicable in their daily life to foster peace of mind and to enhance their stress management. Congruently moderate-to-high improvements in stress management have also been found in quantitative analysis, whereby a lower educational level predicted higher expectations (P = 0.016). Taiji-teachers stated body- and mind-related benefits most frequently and appraised moderate-to-high improvements in stress management. Higher appraisals were predicted by a shorter teaching experience (P = 0.024). Our results inform about beginners' expectations and teachers' appraisals related to a Taiji-beginners course and highlight the role of educational background and teaching experience in shaping stress-management-related beginners' expectations and teachers' appraisals.

Evaluation of Medical Students’ Attitudes and Performance of Basic Surgery Skills in a Training Program Using Fresh Human skin, Excised During Body Contouring Surgeries

BACKGROUND: Learning surgical skills in the operating room may be a challenge for medical students. Therefore, more approaches using simulation to enable students to develop their practical skills are required. OBJECTIVES: We hypothesized that (1) there would be a need for additional surgical training for medical students in the pre-final year, and (2) our basic surgery skills training program using fresh human skin would improve medical students' surgical skills. DESIGN: We conducted a preliminary survey of medical students to clarify the need for further training in basic surgery procedures. A new approach using simulation to teach surgical skills on human skin was set up. The procedural skills of 15 randomly selected students were assessed in the operating room before and after participation in the simulation, using Objective Structured Assessment of Technical Skills. Furthermore, subjective assessment was performed based on students' self-evaluation. The data were analyzed using SPSS, version 21 (SPSS, Inc., Chicago, IL). SETTING: The study took place at the Inselspital, Bern University Hospital. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 186 pre-final-year medical students were enrolled into the preliminary survey; 15 randomly selected medical students participated in the basic surgical skills training course on the fresh human skin operating room. RESULTS: The preliminary survey revealed the need for a surgical skills curriculum. The simulation approach we developed showed significant (p < 0.001) improvement for all 12 surgical skills, with mean cumulative precourse and postcourse values of 31.25 ± 5.013 and 45.38 ± 3.557, respectively. The self-evaluation contained positive feedback as well. CONCLUSION: Simulation of surgery using human tissue samples could help medical students become more proficient in handling surgical instruments before stepping into a real surgical situation. We suggest further studies evaluating our proposed teaching method and the possibility of integrating this simulation approach into the medical school curriculum.

Otium et negotium. Reading processes and their cultural backgrounds in early Italian and German humanism

Reading and reading habits have radically changed in the digital age. Readers are no longer physically bound to textual objects and libraries, they deal with texts by copying, altering, and annotating them, and they mix established textual forms with other semiotic systems such as pictograms, icons and images. These circumstances also provoke a renewed research interest in the history of reading. In this talk, I will concentrate on reading processes as to how they were enacted and practised in early Italian and German humanism. I will start with some paradigmatic scenes described in Petrarch’s letters (among others the famous visit of the Mont Ventoux, where Petrarch, after having enjoyed a spectacular panorama, withdraws into the contemplative reading of St-Augustine). The transmission of Petrarch’s writings in humanist circles of Southern Germany (e.g. with the Schedel and Gossembrot families in Nurnberg, Augsburg and Strasburg) will then lead to specific reading practices documented in manuscripts that once belonged to coherent libraries and are nowadays spread all over Europe. In the case of the former tradesman and mayor Sigismund Gossembrot, complex habits of textual annotating and cross-referencing can be observed. The dichotomy of the Latin terms otium (‘rest’ and ‘leisure’) and negotium (‘activity’, but also ‘practice’, ‘negotiation’, ‘circulation of social energy’ in the sense of New Historicism) will be used as an ideal-type outline to describe the occurring processes of reading.