Abstract
BackgroundRespiratory disease is a major cause of morbidity and mortality not only in the United Kingdom, but globally. A good understanding of respiratory disease and its treatment is essential for all medical graduates. As a result of changes in clinical practice, patients with some common respiratory illnesses are less often admitted to hospital, restricting the experience available to undergraduate students. Combined with a potential shortage of clinical teachers, this means that new methods of teaching need to be developed and appraised. The aim of this study was to establish whether a web-based package on the diagnosis of respiratory disease would be as effective and as acceptable to final year medical students as tutor-led methods of teaching the same material.Methods137 out of 315 final year undergraduate students in a single medical school volunteered to take part. Each received up to two hours of tutor-lead interactive, tutor-lead didactic or electronic, Web-based teaching on the accurate diagnosis and management of respiratory disease. Post teaching performance was assessed by multiple true/false questions and data interpretation exercises, whilst students' teaching preferences were assessed by questionnaire.ResultsDespite a high knowledge baseline before the study, there was a small, but statistically significant increase in knowledge score after all forms of teaching. Similarly, data interpretation skills improved in all groups, irrespective of teaching format, Although paradoxically most students expressed a preference for interactive tutor-lead teaching, spirometry interpretation in those receiving web-based teaching improved significantly more [p = 0.041] than in those in the interactive group.ConclusionWeb-based teaching is at least as good as other teaching formats, but we need to overcome students' reluctance to engage with this teaching method.
Highlights
Respiratory disease is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in the United Kingdom, but globally
An additional problem for teachers of respiratory medicine is that many respiratory patients are treated within the community, rather than as hospital in-patients, potentially limiting the range of direct experience open to undergraduate and junior postgraduate trainees
Another significant pressure at present is the need in the United Kingdom to develop a coherent programme of postgraduate education in response to the recent re-structuring of clinical training in the first two postgraduate years
Summary
Respiratory disease is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in the United Kingdom, but globally. BMC Medical Education 2007, 7:41 http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6920/7/41 hours in the workplace Together these factors have combined to reduce the number of staff available to teach. An additional problem for teachers of respiratory medicine is that many respiratory patients are treated within the community, rather than as hospital in-patients, potentially limiting the range of direct experience open to undergraduate and junior postgraduate trainees. Another significant pressure at present is the need in the United Kingdom to develop a coherent programme of postgraduate education in response to the recent re-structuring of clinical training in the first two postgraduate years. As a result of these combined pressures, many medical schools are developing e-learning packages which will meet current or anticipated shortfalls in undergraduate teaching and which, in addition, can be made available as postgraduate learning resources
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary 
Published Version (
Free)
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call