Medical Student Duty Hours and Shelf Performance - Is there a Correlation?

Abstract

To date, there is limited information about medical student duty hours, shelf scores, and overall clerkship performance in Obstetrics and Gynecology. As a result, we were curious to know whether spending more time in the clinical environment translated to an improved learning experience or, in contrast, translated to decreased study time and worse overall clerkship performance. A retrospective cohort analysis was performed at a single academic medical center of all medical students on the Obstetrics and Gynecology clerkship from August 2018 to June 2019. Recorded student duty hours were tabulated per day and per week, by student. National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) Subject Exam (Shelf) equated percentile scores for the quarter of year were used. Our statistical analysis showed that working long hours did not translate to higher or lower shelf score, or higher overall clerkship grade. However, working longer hours in the last two weeks of the clerkship was associated with high shelf score. Longer medical student duty hours did not correlate to higher shelf scores or overall clerkship grades. Future multi-center studies are necessary to evaluate the importance of medical student duty hours and continue optimizing the educational experience of the OB/GYN clerkship.