iRADiX

For a moment I was lost. As far as I can recall, in 25 years of working with residents, no one had asked this question before. ..

"Sir, can I make a copy of our teaching files on CDs and take them with me?

It is creditable that not one but two residents asked me this question on successive days. Creditable because if they just made the copies and gone away, no one – not in the least I – would have known and everybody could have lived happily ever after. Couple day later, in an entirely different context, another resident told me "Sir, people will use this material to show them as their own…"

I have always felt that the human "hunter- gatherer" instinct comes back to haunt us when we join residency. We hunt and gather x ray films of patients – films which we think are "interesting".

Therefore, for this poor patient with hyperparathyroidism, 7 sets of x rays find their way into residents’ "collections".

The medicine guy - to whom the patient first came - has it, the endocrine fellow has one because he saw the patient on referral ..ditto for the ortho guy; the surgical resident couldn’t care a fig about hyper… whatever it is called – except that it means an opportunity to knock off the gland – but he still makes a set for himself and finally the radiology residents have the monopoly over the stuff – the registrar has one, the houseman another and lecturer the best of them all. And, at the end of all this, the patient has a distal phalanx of the middle finger missing due to radiation therapy!!

These "collections" used to provide great opportunity for the worst hunter-gatherer of them all – me! You see, there was a golden period in the 80s when I used to have a friendly servant in the RMOs hostel, who at the end of each room reallocation would get a huge pile of films back to me in radiology – a pile that residents had left behind in or outside their rooms. Now that there were through with the exams, they had no use for them. Ask them how many times they saw their "collection" in the last three years – a big zero.

Scanners and digital imaging have made it all very easy - thankfully sparing the patient much radiation and endless visits to radiology.

But nothing else has changed. Only, we have graduated to "digital hunter-gatherers"

It can all be made very simple- like these residents – who were decent enough to ask for permission – and feel good about what you have done and when you do use the stuff acknowledge the source.

I for one, have no hesitation is giving away material whether it is images or PowerPoint presentations – after all – teaching is all about giving… of course, there are the others who guard these possessions jealously. My logic is simple – you cannot fool everyone all the time. Sooner or later, if you use plagiarized material you will be caught and the balloon will burst. If on the other hand, you use them and behave like a gentle man acknowledging the source - your stock will only go up.

As for our own people taking stuff with them when they leave the department is concerned – how can anyone object? These are the same people who often toiled hard and long to run the department - who in their own small or big ways contributed to the teaching material, who will be the flag bearers of the department in the outside world. In their success lies the departments pride.

So take all you want – but also remember – give all you can – when you can.

And when you make a presentation, make sure the GS logo is somewhere there – flying high and sounding loud.