Mapping students' clinical experiences to pediatric clerkship goals

In anticipation of new LCME accreditation requirements, our third year clerkship students began tracking pediatric clinical experiences using a hand-held Electronic Student Encounter Log (ESEL) in June 2005. ESEL was tailored to support rapid documentation of diseases seen at a pediatric tertiary care hospital, while retaining access to primary care diagnoses. We matched encounters that 37 students documented to experiences that fulfill the pediatric clerkship's 19 educational goals. We discovered omissions in both ESEL and the goal definitions. No student documented meeting all goals, and no goal was met by all students. Handheld encounter logs are useful for tracking clinical experiences. Logs, logging instructions, and goals require regular compatibility checks.