Below: Internal Medicine Chief Resident Andrew Parziale, MD, (far left) looks on as fourth-year students (left to right) Laura Barry, Michael Nalepa III, and Megan Nahass examine their patient. 2016 BootCamp Directors: Emergency Medicine Meigra M. Chin, MD Family Medicine and Community Health Marissa J. Stabile, DO Internal Medicine Dana J. Herrigel, MD Ob/Gyn Meir Olcha, MD Pediatrics Elizabeth Goodman, MD Psychiatry Anthony Tobia, MD Surgery Theodore E. Eisenstat, MD ical in the last two years. It gives them a little leg up for the start of their internship.” Ultimately, the BootCamps help students develop basic organizational and communication skills, better understand physiology, review common diagnostic and therapeutic scenarios, enhance the use of evidence-based medicine, and improve their clinical abilities. adapting the initiative to other specialties. Now, in addition to pediatrics, BootCamps in the areas of emergency medicine, family medicine, internal medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, psychiatry, and surgery prepare students for what to expect in their chosen fields. It is this approach that makes Robert Wood Johnson Medical School’s program different, Dr. Goodman says. “Our BootCamp is set apart because we’re specialtyspecific; most are not,” she explains. “It takes more planning, but it gives more benefit to the students.” For example, writing prescriptions can be a particular concern in pediatrics, because calculating dosages is so different from doing so for adults; as a result, instructors spend time covering that topic in the Pediatric BootCamp, Dr. Goodman says. The experiences and topics covered vary for each specialty. Overall, students complete the course feeling more proficient in many skills and tasks, she says. Those basic skills Robert Wood Johnson I MEDICINE 37 An Academic Leader he BootCamp program became a requirement for all fourth-year Robert Wood Johnson Medical School students in 2014. The BootCamp concept was a result of a task force report of the M3/M4 curriculum, led by Archana Pradhan, MD, MPH, assistant dean for curriculum. When the program was originally piloted by pediatrics, the medical school was at the forefront of this trend, Dr. Goodman says, and it continues to push the envelope by T