Abstract
Background: The COVID-19 pandemic created challenges in providing anatomy instruction to allied health professions. Human anatomy laboratory classes often rely on human cadavers as instructional material. At some institutions, the anatomical instructional method shifted to online resources. It was essential to compare online methods to those used in the traditional cadaver-based curriculum to determine efficacy. A technique was devised to compare these two approaches. The working hypothesis was that virtual human anatomy models are equally effective to traditional methods in providing anatomy instruction to allied health students. Methods: Students enrolled in this study participated in a human anatomy course delivered either in-person or virtually via Aclan’s Anatomy, NetAnatomy, and Anatomy TV. The instructional design was the same except that the in-person learning group participated in a real-time cadaver anatomy lab, while the virtual learning group utilized online models and simulations. Students were assessed using the same three written tests and three laboratory examinations. Results: Student demographics and evaluation outcomes were presented, and no significant differences concerning sex or educational program between the two student cohorts were identified. Post hoc testing revealed no statistically significant differences between student cohort and test-type. The three-way interaction between test type, test number, and cohort was not significant. Conclusions: The findings confirmed the hypothesis. There were no statistically significant differences between the test performance of human anatomy students who received online training versus those who participated in in-person classroom instruction. These results suggest that human anatomy can be taught effectively using an online format.
Highlights
The COVID-19 pandemic created numerous challenges for education and the learning process. These challenges were apparent in programs that provided instruction in advanced human anatomy at schools of nursing, medicine, and allied health professions
The hands-on study of human cadavers is widely regarded as the "gold standard" for medical training and instruction in human anatomy [1]
Human cadaver specimens provide students with direct multisensorial learning of the human body while eliminating the possibility of harming a live person or incurring significant liability resulting from errors made during the educational phase of their career
Summary
The COVID-19 pandemic created numerous challenges for education and the learning process These challenges were apparent in programs that provided instruction in advanced human anatomy at schools of nursing, medicine, and allied health professions. The working hypothesis was that virtual human anatomy models are effective to traditional methods in providing anatomy instruction to allied health students. The working hypothesis is that virtual models of human anatomy are if not more effective, than traditional "hands-on" instruction provided to medical, nursing, and allied health students. Two cohorts of allied health science students at Touro University Nevada received instruction in human anatomy were examined These groups included 40 students engaged in traditional in-person classroom learning before the COVID-19 restrictions were in place and 39 students who received online instruction only with virtual models during the COVID-19 quarantine. As per Hoffman and Roussos (2020), the repeated measures design is appropriate for this type of evaluation [8]
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