Teaching medical students - what's in it for teachers?

The term 'doctor' comes from the Latin 'docere' meaning 'to teach'. Although few general practitioners have formal teaching skills or qualifications, we are all involved in teaching patients every day. The importance of our role as educators has been recognised for a long time, with the first statements of the Hippocratic Oath dealing with respect for our teachers and our duty to pass our knowledge on to others.     

A positive or a negative confounding variable? A simple teaching aid for clinicians and students

Anticipating the direction of a confounding variable can be problematic especially to introductory students. Using elementary rules of mathematics, we describe below a simple instructional tool for deriving the direction of confounding bias. The tool is illustrated with examples and a heuristic mathematical justification is also described.     

Do preschool teachers consider inferences for book discussions?

This study examined whether or not preschool teachers attended to instances requiring inference‐making in story books. Thirty‐one preschool teachers were asked to read three fictional story books and to identify parts of the story that would be difficult for young children to interpret. Additionally, they were asked to construct questions that they would ask three to five year olds about the stories during classroom book reading. As expected, in many instances, teachers did not identify the need for inference‐making as a part of the stories that would require explanation, and did not generate analytical questions about inferences to be directed at young children. Results indicated that there were no differences between types of teacher responses on the basis of educational level or years of teaching experience. The outcomes are discussed in terms of young children’s cognitive and language abilities and suggest that preschool teachers need to be made aware of young children’s limited understandings of non‐literal language to promote comprehension of books in the classroom.     

What predicts drive for muscularity in college students?

While research has established that men tend to exhibit greater levels of DFM than women, little research has examined the relation between DFM and other forms of disordered eating and exercise behaviors. Study 1 examined the influence of disordered eating and obligatory exercise on DFM in male and female college students. In women, DFM was related to eating concern and obligatory exercise; whereas in men, DFM was related to obligatory exercise and shape concern. Study 2 examined the influence of exercise motivations and body dissatisfaction on DFM in male and female college students. In women, DFM was predicted by personal goal achievement exercise motives, exercising to cope, and dissatisfaction with specific body areas. In men, DFM was predicted by appearance orientation, personal goal achievement, affiliation, and recognition exercise motives.     

Interactive logbooks for medical students: are they useful?

OBJECTIVES: The use of logbooks in the education of medical undergraduate students is not well-established. Traditionally, logbooks are used simply as a means for students to document their activities. This report examines whether logbooks used as an interactive vehicle between students and tutors can assist both student learning and Faculty teaching. METHOD: As part of the New Medical Curriculum implemented by the Faculty of Medicine, The University of Hong Kong, all third year students beginning their formal hospital and community health clerkships were given pocket-sized logbooks to document and monitor their learning activities. The logbooks were specially designed to mirror the activities of the teaching blocks, including bedside teaching, tutorials, teaching clinics, health care projects, and whole class sessions, etc. RESULTS: At the end of each teaching block, effort, accuracy of the notes, appropriateness of the notes and the assessor's overall impression of logbook entries formed the basis of 20-point assessment. Randomly-selected logbooks were reviewed at the end of every rotation and compared with course outlines in order to evaluate if, according to the students' notes, the learning objectives were being met. Throughout each teaching block, the logbook process identified students who could benefit from counselling and/or remediation. The logbook feedback mechanism was immediate and therefore, remediation was timely and appropriate. CONCLUSIONS: The logbooks were effective in 3 ways: logbooks were a means of continuous assessment of small group learning; logbooks encouraged immediate and ongoing interaction between tutors and students; and they provided a feedback loop for the evaluation of learning activities.     

Anxiety in medical students: is preparation for full‐time clinical attachments more dependent upon differences in maturity or on educational programmes for undergraduate and graduate entry students?

INTRODUCTION: The transition to full-time clinical studies holds anxieties for most medical students. While graduate entry medical education has only recently begun in the UK, the parallel undergraduate and graduate entry MBBS courses taught at our school allowed us to study how 2 differently prepared groups perceived this vital time at a comparable stage in their training. METHOD: An anonymous questionnaire collected demographic data and graded anxiety in 13 statements relating to starting full-time clinical attachments. Two open questions allowed free text comment on the most positive and negative influences perceived during this time. Both a statistical analysis and a qualitative assessment were performed to compare the 2 groups of students. RESULTS: The 2 groups were similar with respect to gender but the graduate entry students were significantly older. The graduate entry students were significantly less anxious about most aspects of the transition period compared to the undergraduates. These course differences remained after adjusting for age and sex. When adjusted for course and age, male students expressed less anxiety. The main positive qualitative statements related to continual clinical and communication skills training in the graduate entry group. The main qualitative concerns in both groups related to 'fitting in' and perceived lack of factual knowledge. DISCUSSION: These data support the early introduction of clinical skills teaching, backed up by a fully integrated clinically relevant curriculum with continued assessment, in preparing students and reducing levels of anxiety before they start full-time clinical attachments. These course design differences appear to be more important than any differences in maturity between the 2 groups.