By Laura Ingles
VCU School of Medicine

When Brigitte Lieu started at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine in 2023, she already had orthopaedic surgery in the back of her mind. She had spent the prior two years working as a scribe in a pediatric orthopaedics office, and the specialty has been high on her list of possible career choices. Now in her third year of medical school, Lieu has multiple research projects under her belt, due in part to the support she has received from mentors in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery.

Every week, students who are interested in orthopaedics research meet over Zoom with current residents, fellows and faculty. The group discusses ongoing projects and upcoming opportunities, and Lieu said students are encouraged to pitch ideas and are assured that there are “no stupid questions.” The community has connected her with faculty and trainees in the field, given her a sense of what being an orthopaedic surgeon could be like and built her confidence as a researcher.

“The work is fun, and I find it nice to also be doing something that isn't just studying,” Lieu said of doing research projects with the group. “We all bounce ideas off each other and split the data analysis and writing workload, which makes us a lot more productive. It’s a really strong mentorship network.”

For some trainees and faculty in the department, working with students like Lieu is an opportunity to pay it forward and provide the same kind of support they received when pursuing the highly selective specialty.

“You need a strong support system to make it in orthopaedic surgery,” said Brady Ernst, M.D., a fourth-year orthopaedic surgery resident and VCU School of Medicine alum. “I got a lot of help from previous residents in our department with research and great mentorship when I was a student, and it was something I wanted to continue being involved with.”

Exploring AI in orthopaedics

With the support of her peers and mentors in the group, one of Lieu's research projects examined the accuracy and readability of the AI chatbot ChatGPT’s responses to questions about osteosarcoma, a rare and aggressive bone cancer. They asked ChatGPT questions frequently asked by patients, like “What symptoms will I experience?” and “What does the treatment entail?” After recording the responses, they compared them to clinical literature about the disease and rated how accurate and readable the statements were, and whether they required more clarification.  

Overall, Lieu said, the responses were “surprisingly accurate,” but most required further clarification and were written at a reading level ranging from that of a seventh grader to a college graduate. (The American Medical Association and the National Institutes of Health recommend that medical information for the public be written at or below a sixth-grade reading level.) 

“It’s such a new technology that it’s kind of impressive that all of the responses had a baseline level of accuracy,” Lieu said. “But it’s not quite there to achieve the level of clarity a patient would need to use as an adjunct to a face-to-face consultation with a health care professional.”  

Lieu plans to conduct a similar ChatGPT study on scoliosis in pediatric populations.

Finding community in a competitive field

With 1,590 applicants vying for 929 residency positions in the 2025 Match, orthopaedic surgery is one of the most competitive specialties in medicine. According to Ernst, that’s where the mentorship network comes in. The group, which is open to any students who are interested in orthopaedic surgery, shows future physicians the ins and outs of research methodology and how it fits into the field.

Ernst said the experience not only helps students stand out on residency applications but also begins to prepare them for careers in a fast-paced, evolving specialty that relies heavily on research.

“Knowing how to read, interpret and synthesize data is a necessary part of your training to become a better surgeon,” Ernst said. “Even if you choose not to do research throughout your career, you still have to know how to understand and read it because everything we do is based off research.”

Brett Goodloe, M.D., a School of Medicine graduate who got involved with the mentorship group when he returned to VCU as faculty in 2023, reflected on his own journey to becoming an orthopaedic surgeon.

“I attribute a lot of my success to my training and the mentors that I had, and I just feel a lot of gratitude for the people who supported me,” Goodloe said. “One of my goals has been to be able to provide that to the medical students here at VCU.”

As one of those students, Lieu is keeping an open mind as she begins her clinical rotations — she said she has the “problem of liking everything I’ve learned about so far” — but plans to stay involved with the orthopaedics group.

“It’s such an opaque specialty and can sometimes be daunting, but I have these guys on speed dial, and I know I can always come to them with ideas or questions,” Lieu said. “I feel really lucky to be at VCU. It’s so tight-knit and really does feel like a family.”

This story was originally published on the VCU School of Medicine website.