English

Abstract

BACKGROUND Medical students in India come from diverse cultural, linguistic, economic and social backgrounds. Further, students from similar backgrounds are often found to have obtained their school education from different educational boards. Thus, to ensure a smooth initiation of these diverse population of high school graduates to the challenging medical science curriculum, a foundation course at the beginning of Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) programme was considered to be of utmost importance. General guidelines for this ‘Foundation Course’ were laid down and all institutions were expected to abide by them but provisions were allowed to institutions to make local changes depending on the context and requirements. We wanted to analyse the feedback from the students regarding the foundation course. METHODS A pre-validated questionnaire-based, cross-sectional study was carried out among MBBS students in our institution. The study was conducted in the month of November 2019 after obtaining the institutional ethics committee clearance. RESULTS Most of the students agreed (a total of 86 out of 96 students) with the comment that the course fulfilled the objectives set out in the foundation course brochure. 52.08 % students agreed and 29.16 % students strongly agreed that the course satisfied their need and expectations. 88 out of 96 students agreed that there was opportunity for feedback and evaluation which in turn gives the scope to introduce formative assessment in the course. This constituted the best part in our learning experience. CONCLUSIONS In general, majority of the students’ feedback on the foundation course was in an affirmative note. Most of them felt that the course was well structured and informative enough for them to apply the newly learnt lessons to cope with some of their real-life problems. Their positive feedback as well as the relevant suggestions they submitted will obviously contribute towards encouraging the involved faculties as well as the institute to execute the foundation course in a more user-friendly and structured manner in the future years to come. KEYWORDS Foundation Course, Feedback, MBBS