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- Title:
Can near-peer medical students effectively teach a new curriculum in physical examination?
- Document type:
- Journal Article; Randomized Controlled Trial; Article
- Author(s):
- Blank, Wolfgang A; Blankenfeld, Hannes; Vogelmann, Roger; Linde, Klaus; Schneider, Antonius
- Abstract:
- Students in German medical schools frequently complain that the subject 'clinical examination' is not taught in a satisfying manner due to time constraints and lack of personnel resources. While the effectiveness and efficiency of practice-oriented teaching in small groups using near-peer teaching has been shown, it is rarely used in German medical schools. We investigated whether adding a new near-peer teaching course developed with student input plus patient examination under supervision in small groups improves basic clinical examination skills in third year medical students compared to a traditional clinical examination course alone.Third year medical students registered for the mandatory curricular clinical examination course at the medical faculty of the Technische Universität München were invited to participate in a randomised trial with blinded outcome assessment. Students were randomised to the control group participating in the established curricular physical examination course or to the intervention group, which received additional near-peer teaching for the same content. The learning success was verified by a voluntary objective structured clinical examination (OSCE).A total of 84 students were randomised and 53 (63%) participated in the final OSCE. Students in the control group scored a median of 57% (25th percentile 47%, 75th percentile 61%) of the maximum possible total points of the OSCE compared to 77% (73%, 80%; p < 0.001) for students in the intervention group. Only two students in the intervention group received a lower score than the best student in the control group.Adding a near-peer teaching course to the routine course significantly improved the clinical examination skills of medical students in an efficient manner in the context of a resource-constrained setting.
- Journal title abbreviation:
- BMC Med Educ
- Year:
- 2013
- Journal volume:
- 13
- Pages contribution:
- 165
- Language:
- eng
- Fulltext / DOI:
- doi:10.1186/1472-6920-13-165
- Pubmed ID:
- http://view.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24325639
- Print-ISSN:
- 1472-6920
- TUM Institution:
- Lehrstuhl für Allgemeinmedizin (Prof. Schneider) (keine SAP-Zuordnung!)
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