Perceptions of students and faculty about conventional learning and community-oriented medical education.

Full Abstract

OBJECTIVE:
To compare the perceptions of the students and faculty to the conventional lecture and practical-based learning (LPBL) with community-oriented-Medical Education (COME).

DESIGN:
Descriptive longitudinal study based on evaluations of two different methods.

PLACE AND DURATION OF STUDY:
Dow Medical College, Karachi, March to June 2001.

SUBJECTS AND METHODS:
All the 364 students who were admitted to Dow Medical College in the year 2001, were taught for eight weeks by the conventional lecture and practical-based learning (LPBL) method. The perceptions of students and 63 faculty members to LPBL was found by a 14-item questionnaire (containing 11 questions on the Likert Scale and 3 open-ended questions). A four-week field trial of COME was carried out during which all other teaching was suspended. Similar questionnaires about COME were repeated for the 301 students (now present) and 63 faculty members.The responses for each question for the LPBL and COME questionnaires were compared by the Wilcoxon Signed-Rank test.

RESULTS:
Students and Faculty found COME significantly better (p<0.05) than LPBL in promoting community awareness, empathy, group interaction, life-long self-study skills, clinical relevance and not solely exam-oriented.The students also found it promotional for interest, retention of information, problem solving and communication skills. The faculty felt that clinical skills and research methodologies were learnt better by COME. Both, the students and the faculty found no significant difference by either method in understanding the topic or in the importance of the tutor's expertise.COME was perceived as more resource-intensive in terms of time, teachers and space. It was suggested that core lectures should continue side by side with COME.

CONCLUSION:
Both, students and faculty found COME a more clinically and socially relevant way of studying medicine than LPBL.

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Author information

Author/s: Khan, Imrana (I); Fareed, Aslam (A);

Affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan.

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Comparative Study; Journal Article

Journal: Journal of the College of Physicians and Surgeons--Pakistan : JCPSP (J Coll Physicians Surg Pak), published in Pakistan. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2003-Feb; vol 13 (issue 2) : pp 82-5

Dates: Created 2003/04/10; Completed 2003/05/20; Revised 2006/11/15;

PMID: 12685949, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 12/26/2008)

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MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MESH Headings shown below.

Education, Medical, Undergraduate - methods
Faculty, Medical
Humans
Longitudinal Studies
Perception

Perception
Problem-Based Learning - methods
Questionnaires
Students, Medical
Teaching - methods

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