“Hold still and keep your eye shut tight,” I instructed, as I lathered my probe with gel and placed it carefully on my model’s left eye. Having just narrowly escaped the brink of elimination, we were riding a wave of momentum. The trophy was so close we could taste it, but the final round of SonoSlam 2017 was a real-time scan-off on model patients, and our opponents had already proven their skill. Having a live audience didn’t make imaging a pupillary reflex or calculating ejection fraction any easier, and we were feeling the heat.

The day began with scans on rotating stations testing basic knowledge and technique for various organ systems. We struggled with the hepatobiliary station (turns out most teams did over the course of the day; guess we all need more practice) and the physics/knowledge station (I still don’t know how Fourier functions are used to convert sinusoidal data to Cartesian data to produce an image). Still, we put in a strong showing, and at halftime, of 27 teams, 2 of the 3 Ohio State teams placed in the top 5.

Round 2 was trickier but more entertaining than round 1, with stations designed to test our technique and creativity. Among the highlights: identifying an image acquired by a teammate via ultrasound charades, guiding a blindfolded teammate to acquire the correct scan using nothing but verbal cues, and acquiring a biopsy sample under ultrasound guidance. These were difficult, but despite a few groans of frustration, we enjoyed ourselves as we raced through the stations. We felt so good about our performance that we even let ourselves think ahead, speculating whether we would face our teammates in the final. That changed quickly, however, with the announcement of the finalists: we had made the final, but placed third, and were the only OSU team left.

The first challenge of the finals was Dr. Boulger’s favorite ultrasound game, the peel-and-reveal. Tiles filling the screen are removed one by one until someone correctly guesses the image underneath, with more points awarded the more tiles remained. Any hesitation or uncertainty meant more points for the competition, and only the top 2 teams would survive till the second round. Watching the other teams grab an early lead, we sweated bullets as we clawed our way back, only to fall behind again with a premature guess. It was neck-and-neck till the very end, when a gutsy call of McConnell’s sign from Sam edged us into second place. We collapsed back into our chairs in relief, and our attendings, watching from the back, let out their collective breath, probably.

For the final challenge, each team sent a representative to scan on live models behind a closed curtain, with their screens displayed for the audience to see. Each team member had to scan twice, and the audience would vote on the better image by way of cheers and applause. They were also allowed to give advice to the scanners, which meant the auditorium soon became a pandemonium of shouted instructions. Objectives included cardiac output and bladder calculations, MSK ultrasound, and ocular imaging. This time we took the early lead thanks to Charles’ affinity for shoulder scans, but quickly ran into setbacks as well (hard to measure bladder volume when the patient had just peed). We managed to keep up our momentum, however, and after 6 nerve-wracking rounds, we edged our opponents 4-2, clinching the SonoSlam championship for Ohio State for the second time.

Looking back on the day’s events, I am proud of our team’s accomplishments but also impressed with the competition. We have great mentors and almost a decade of ultrasound experience between the 3 of us, but some of the other teams were no less strong, and frankly we were very fortunate to take home the title. To me, this means a bright future for ultrasound education, as medical students across the country are learning valuable skills that will put them in good stead for residency and beyond. More importantly, it means that next year’s teams will have to step up their game, as Ohio State must now defend its title as 2-time SonoSlam champion. No pressure, guys.

Have you participated in SomoSlam? If so, tell us about your experience. Comment below or let us know on Twitter: @AIUM_Ultrasound.

The 2017 SonoSlam champions, The Rolling Sonograms, was composed of Samatha King, Charles McCombs, and Jeffrey Yu. Samantha King is a fourth year medical student from the Ohio State University College of Medicine planning to pursue a career in emergency medicine. Charles McCombs is a third year medical student at the Ohio State University College of Medicine and hopes to end up in pediatrics and/or emergency medicine. Jeffrey Yu is an anesthesiology PGY-1 at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.