Failure Is an Option: Using Errors as Teaching Opportunities

In continuation, the Council on Medical Student Education in Pediatrics series describing the characteristics and skills of effective clinical teachers by providing a practical framework for using errors as opportunities to promote the professional growth of students, is discussed, with the purposes of medical error as the failure of a planned action to be completed as intended or the use of a wrong plan to achieve an aim. Many students will experience an error during medical school and may be reluctant to report their own errors for fear of negatively impacting their evaluations, while hidden curriculum, which refers to the implicit culture of rules and norms present in the clinical learning environment, may also discourage a student from speaking up.