Construction and practice of an integrated interdisciplinary course in clinical laboratory science based on cases

Abstract

Objective To investigate the construction and practice of an integrated interdisciplinary course based on cases and its effect on the development of common competency in students majoring in clinical laboratory science. Methods 116 students majoring in clinical laboratory science were enrolled from class 2014 (control group, n=59) and class 2015 (experimental group, n=57) in the study. The integrated interdisciplinary course based on cases was taught in the experimental group, while the traditional courses were taught in the controls. At the end of the fourth semester, exam scores of pathophysiology of all the students were compared. Questionnaires for teaching effects were scored in the experimental group at the beginning and at the end of the experiment semester, respectively. The scores were processed with SPSS 19.0 for independent-samples t-test. The experimental group was further divided into two subgroups, experimental class 1 with the course taught as case-based learning (CBL) and experimental class 2 with the course taught as team-based learning (TBL). Comparison between the questionnaire scores and the patho-physiology scores were also performed in the two experimental classes. Results The pathophysiology scores of the experimental group (75.65±7.13) were significantly higher than those of the controls (69.94±9.77), P=0.000. The scores of the 15 indicators in the questionnaire for the experimental group were significantly higher at the end of the semester than those at the beginning of the semester (P<0.01), including scores of learning interest [(7.59±1.48) vs. (3.81±1.80)], connection among basic medicine courses [(8.19±1.22) vs. (4.07±1.57)], integration of basic and clinical medicine courses [(8.33±1.19) vs. (3.36±1.42)], problem analyzing ability[(8.10±1.17) vs. (3.64±1.44)], problem solving ability [(7.71±1.14) vs. (4.12±1.51)], self-learning ability [(8.07±1.55) vs. (3.52±1.54)], communication skills [(8.02±1.15) vs. (3.59±1.34)], teamwork [(7.55±1.17) vs. (3.19±1.38)], and critical thinking [(7.41±1.23) vs. (3.72±1.36)] at the end of the semester and at the beginning of the semester, respectively. Conclusion The integrated interdisciplinary course based on cases can promote the development of post competency among students majoring in clinical laboratory science during basic medical education. Key words: Case-based learning; Integrated interdisciplinary course; Basic medicine; Clinical laboratory science; Post competency