Narrative reflections from a night on trauma call: an innovative way to identify with student experiences

Reflective practices can help learners process new clinical encounters. We sought to understand how clerkship students process exposure to intense experiences by assigning them to reflect on overnight trauma call.

Third year medical students participated in one overnight trauma call at our Level 1 trauma center during their required surgery clerkship and submitted written reflections to an online learning management system. Data were deidentified for qualitative analysis by two independent reviewers who identified common themes via qualitative content analysis.

All student reflections from academic year 2021–2022 were analyzed. Primary themes identified were teamwork, novelty, patient humanity, and role-modeling.

Medical student reflections provided insight into the student experience of overnight trauma call. Descriptive data can identify which elements of trauma care are most impactful to students, which may guide educators in how to best support students during these novel clinical experiences.