The Return of Bedside Rounds

Excerpt

To the editors: We applaud the effort by Gonzalo et al. to increase bedside rounding by internal medicine residents1. However, we do wish to comment on their study’s expressed motive, a perceived downward trend in the fraction of medical education taking place at the bedside. Among the many physician-educators lamenting this trend since the 1960s, LaCombe’s 1997 commentary in the Annals of Internal Medicine has been particularly influential2. His statement that, “In the old days, 30 years ago, 75% of teaching was at the bedside. … By 1978, that figure had decreased to 16%” has been widely repeated in the literature on bedside teaching, including in the article by Gonzalo et al. …