Our clinical and didactic educational curriculum covers the three-year training period, allowing residents the opportunity to build upon foundational knowledge throughout their residency. Sessions are led by both co-residents and faculty, and cover sub-specialty and foundational topics. Scheduling information can be found here.

Slide conference

Third-year residents lead these sessions weekly, which consist of “unknown” clinical images from the literature, personal, or attending collections. Each resident presents six slide conferences during final year of residency. During this interactive conference, each resident is expected to provide a possible diagnosis, building an exhaustive differential diagnosis for each image. This conference not only emphasizes morphology and pattern recognition, but also includes discussions of the disease entities presented. Attendance by a faculty mentor allows for additional contribution to the discussions.

Weekly Zoom slide conference each led by a senior resident brings our residents together to solve mystery kodachromes, with attending support and often lots of laughter!

Dermatopathology teaching

Dermatopathology sessions are held at the multi-headed microscope or on Zoom (as of 2020) and conducted as “unknowns” with rotating teaching by dermatopathology faculty and the dermatopathology fellow. There are a series of introductory sessions led by faculty for the first-year residents.

Pre-COVID dermpath teaching session at our multi-headed microscope in the Dermatopathology Center.

Grand Rounds

Grand Rounds is held every Thursday morning and includes patient viewing, discussions of treatment and diagnostics for each patient, as well as resident presentations (consult case presentations, cutting-edge dermatology topics, morbidity and mortality conference).

Journal Club

Journal Club is held two to three times each month, and rotates between a variety of formats including clinical journal club, basic science journal club, and dermatology “round-table” (several articles from a single of issue of either JAMA Dermatology, JAAD, British Journal of Dermatology, or a sub-specialty journal to review briefly). All Journal Club sessions are led by residents on a rotating basis, with faculty mentorship and participation.

Dermatology core curriculum

These lectures are given by our Division of Dermatology faculty members on topics related to their clinical and/or research expertise, and will feature rotating topics over the course of the three-year residency training period.

Additional educational sessions

CME presentations

Second-year residents each present 1 CME lecture on a pre-determined topic. Material from CME articles in the Journal of American Academy of Dermatology as well as related practice guidelines and/or clinical reviews are employed to cover the foundation of the given topic as well as expansion on diagnostic and treatment algorithms. These are interactive, discussion-based sessions, and also include faculty participation.

Melanoma disease management team conference

These multi-disciplinary conferences are held on the 2nd and 4th Thursdays of each month before Grand Rounds and include presentations of challenging melanoma and other high-risk cutaneous oncology cases by medical oncology, surgical oncology, and dermatology. Radiology and pathology images are often presented to aid in diagnostic and management discussions. Residents may occasionally be asked to present clinical information patients seen in our dermatology clinics.

Career development series

These sessions focus on a variety of topics related to career development and include: panels on careers in dermatology (academic and private practice), CV workshop, contract basics, healthcare climate, tools for academic work, and finding meaning in your career.

Diversity, inclusion, equity and anti-racism series

Throughout the year, these sessions will include peer workshops on micro/macro-aggressions and allyship, book club discussions, lectures on skin of color and healthcare disparities, and journal club discussions. Additionally, the Washington University dermatology residency program has committed to include diverse representation in all didactic sessions with a goal of including images of all conditions presented in skin of color in addition to white skin.

First-year curriculum

To build a strong foundation of dermatology knowledge, first-year residents participate in weekly or bimonthly peer-led discussions covering morphology, common diagnoses, and treatment modalities. A topic-based reading guide is provided.