Results for the 2009 EM Congress Clinical Pathologic Case (CPC) Competition

Featuring 12 competitors from 11 different countries, the CPC Competition was a huge success! After a full day of competition, the judges awarded the top three places during a small ceremony, complete with Cava for all the contestants. The winners were as follows:

  • 1st place: Dr. Christine Kulstad, Illinois
  • 2nd place: Dr. Tony Joseph, Australia
  • 3rd place: Dr. Susan Laidlaw, Saudi Arabia

Thank you to all who participated; we look forward to seeing you in 2011!

Kind regards,

Carl Germann, CPC Chair
John Southall, CPC Co-Chair


Clinical Pathological Case (CPC) Competition Information

The Fifth Mediterranean Emergency Medicine Congress will be hosting a Clinical Pathologic Case (CPC) competition during the September 2009 meeting in Valencia, Spain. We are currently soliciting contestants. If you or someone in your program is interested in competing, please respond to Dr. Carl Germann at germac@mmc.org.

In summary, contestants will each receive an interesting, different and challenging case no less than four weeks prior to the competition. The case will include a text description of a patient presentation including history, physical exam, other pertinent facts, and ancillary studies individual to the case. These ancillary studies often consist of laboratory data, electrocardiograms, x-rays, and occasionally CT scan images. Based upon the information provided, the contestant will create a twenty-minute presentation discussing the differential diagnosis and ultimately the suspected diagnosis of the case. Presenters are judged on the quality of their presentation. The most important judging criteria is the quality of the differential diagnosis, but contestants will also be judged on their presentation skills including visual impact of their presentation and adherence to time limits. Contestants will receive bonus points for obtaining the correct diagnosis.

The cases have been provided by the Counsel of Residency Directors-Emergency Medicine, USA and have been reviewed by the CPC committee of the Mediterranean Emergency Medicine Congress to ensure that they are appropriate for this forum.

Contestants should use PowerPoint for PC to aid their presentations. We are accepting English language presentations only at this time. Presentations will be emailed to the committee prior to the competition and will be pre-loaded onto a computer at the event site.

The day of the competition, the session moderator will introduce each case to the audience, describing exactly what information the contestant received. The contestant will then have a twenty-minute block to discuss the case. Extra time will be allowed if speaking English is a difficulty. The moderator will then reveal the correct diagnosis.

The competition will take place on Wednesday, 16 September. The results will be released shortly after the final presentation. The winner will receive the recognition of being the Mediterranean Emergency Medicine Congress' CPC winner, and will be recognized at the Congress.

The CPC USA has been a very fun, popular and prestigious competition that has included almost every US based Emergency Medicine training program. While contestants/discussants have typically been faculty members at academic programs, physicians in training are also welcome. We look forward to a great international competition. Space will be limited and an early response is both appreciated and suggested.

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