Health Science Education Research Articles

Trigger factors of using Moodle or e-learning by faculty of Medicine and health Sciences College and Education College

There are several obstacles to implementing e-learning. This study aims to identify barriers and facilitators in using Moodle or e-learning by the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, the College of Health Sciences, and the College of Education. This type of research is qualitative research. This research report is based on the SRQR guidelines. The sample used in this study amounted to seven Faculties of Medicine and Health Sciences, Colleges, and Schools of Education. The method used in collecting data interviews. The instrument used in data collection is an interview sheet. The technique used in analyzing the data is descriptive qualitative analysis. The result of this research is that the study reveals three key factors that represent barriers to using Moodle or e-learning from the participants' perceptions. First, individual barriers (educators & students). Second, institutional barriers or workplace barriers. Third, the participants considered the use of social media (Facebook) in the teaching process unprofessional at the academic level. The English competence of Medical and Health Science students is considered the central supporting factor in using e-learning compared to education students. Participants considered the use of Facebook as unprofessional in academic level communication.

A tool to evaluate physiotherapy clinical education in South Africa.

BackgroundPhysiotherapy clinical education is complex. The dynamic learning milieu is fluid and multidimensional, which contributes to the complexity of the clinical learning experience. Consequently, there are numerous factors which impact the clinical learning experience which cannot be measured objectively – a gap which led to the development of our study.ObjectivesTo develop, validate, and test the reliability of an assessment tool that evaluates the effectiveness and quality of physiotherapy clinical education programmes.MethodA mixed methods approach in three phases included physiotherapy academics, clinical educators, and clinicians throughout South Africa. Phase One was a qualitative study: focus group discussions determined items and domains of the tool. Phase Two established the content and construct validity of the tool, a scoring system and a name for the tool, using the Delphi method. In Phase Three, factor analysis reduced the number of items, and the feasibility and utility of the tool was determined cross-sectionally.ResultsThe Vaneshveri Naidoo Clinical Programme Evaluation Tool (VN-CPET) of 58 items and six domains was developed and found to be valid, reliable (α = 0.75) and useful. The six domains of VN-CPET include governance; academic processes; learning exposure; clinical orientation; clinical supervision and quality assurance and monitoring and evaluation.ConclusionThe Vaneshveri Naidoo Clinical Programme Evaluation Tool is a valid, reliable and standardised tool, that evaluates the quality and effectiveness of physiotherapy clinical education programmes.Clinical implicationsThis tool can objectively evaluate the quality and effectiveness of physiotherapy clinical education programmes in South Africa, and other health science education programmes, both locally and globally, with minor modification.

Signature Pedagogies versus Trauma Informed Approaches: Thematic Analysis of Graduate Students’ Reflections

The COVID-19 pandemic is evidenced as a traumatic event, impacting college students preparing for healthcare careers. Trauma-informed pedagogical evidence-based recommendations include clear instruction, faculty availability, and open acknowledgment of challenges . This study explored trauma-informed mechanisms embedded in a fully online health sciences course at a public New Jersey university, given during COVID-19 pandemic in spring, 2021, to ascertain student perceptions of mechanisms and sense of belonging within the online classroom environment. Thirty-four ( n = 34) Master’s and Doctoral graduate students were enrolled in this course, which met for 3 hours weekly, for a 15 week semester. Qualitative data were collected from students, including 42 reflective posts per student (for a total of 1,428 reflections) and anecdotal observations at semester’s end. Via qualitative reflexive thematic analysis, the following four themes emerged: (1) Recognizing the Moment, (2) Creating Empathic Connections, (3) Appreciating Availability/Flexibility, and (4) Clarity of Instruction. These themes are discussed, and implications for an actionable model for signature pedagogies embedded in trauma-informed care in graduate health science education are reviewed.

Application of Virtual Reality Technology in Adolescent Mental Health Science Education

The 21st century is a time of rapid advances in science and technology, and scientific knowledge and literacy are highly relevant to the development of the country. Science education is the main means of learning scientific and cultural knowledge, and its teaching quality determines the formation of national scientific literacy. In addition, information technology teaching assistants are one of the main research areas in the field of educational technology, and they have long attracted the attention of researchers in the field of education. Based on these facts, this research introduces virtual reality technology into science education to make a favorable influence on the psychological well-being of young people, through color feature extraction, gray-level cooccurrence matrix feature extraction, Marching Cubes algorithm, and image synthesis technology to be scientifically and effectively combined with science education, and the popularization rate of students receiving science education has increased by 26.9%. As a result, the mental health of students was improved, and the number of students with subhealth mentality decreased by 16.9%. Adolescence is a transitional period for adolescents from immaturity to maturity. Adolescents are prone to fall into depression, anxiety, rebellion, autism, and other emotions, which will have a damaging impact on the growth of adolescents’ mental health. The use of virtual reality technology in science education has opened up a new field of virtual teaching and learning. This pattern of education will make a huge influence on the future growth of education and the creation of teaching concepts.

Landscape of health sciences librarian-mediated search services.

Health librarians have traditionally provided mediated searches to support patient care, education and research. This study aims to discover the types of search result formats used by health science libraries, determine current practice among health science libraries (types of requesters served, fees, deduplication, turnaround time and citation manager use) and uncover innovative methods for providing search results. An online survey was distributed to the MEDLIB-L, ExpertSearching, MidContinental Chapter of the Medical Library Association and ICON listservs and through direct email to selected Association of Academic Health Sciences Libraries reference and education librarians. Librarians affiliated with 127 institutions from 11 countries (including the USS) and 36 USS states and territories responded. One hundred and forty-two of the total 150 analysed responses provided information on full-text access, and 81 of those 142 responses (57%) indicated that the institutions' link-resolver links were included in search results provided to the requester. The survey responses provide information on literature search services regarding turnaround time, use of a citation managers, fees and deduplication. With the developing landscape of citation managers and the tools offered, these data can be used as a benchmark for librarians who are considering evaluating or modifying their search service delivery.

Clinical simulation with dramatization, a teaching-learning strategy for undergraduate students of nutrition and dietetics

At present, education in Health Sciences requires interaction with real patients, which is made more complex due to the need to ensure their health safety. For this reason, new teaching methodologies are now being implemented, which help to improve and protect safe care. Objective: This study was carried out using a quantitative approach with a non-experimental, descriptive design. Materials and Methods: The sample was non-probabilistic and consisted of 87 undergraduate students. A questionnaire was used, with 18 statements divided into 3 dimensions: dimension 1, simulation structure, with six questions reflecting aspects related to its implementation; dimension 2, learning, with seven questions related to aspects of effective communication, trust, learning and respect for diversity; dimension 3, feedback for learning, with five questions, including feedback by the teacher and the simulated patient, as well as their own views with regard to participating in another similar experience again. A five-point Likert scale was used. Results: The three dimensions studied, simulation structure, learning and feedback for learning, report a high level of positive perceptions. Conclusion: The simulation strategy is an educational tool in health-related careers that enhances the clinical competencies of the students as well as the relevant theoretical and practical skills and abilities in their learning process, promoting integration of the knowledge acquired in previous subjects.

Empathy for the health professional in online asynchronous graduate education: an initial design thinking approach to program improvement

IntroductionHealth professionals engage in continuous professional development through higher education. As traditional university learning environments pose a challenge to working health professionals, distance education allows these learners to engage in higher education in alignment with their learning preferences and needs. Literature on health professional learners’ experiences in online learning environments report findings at the course level and/or focus on a singular aspect of the online learning experience.ObjectivesIn this initial study, we aim to understand the health professional learner’s perspective in a distance graduate education program and make normative recommendations to improve the health professional learner experience in an online environment.MethodsWithin the context of the Empathy arm of Deitte and Omary’s (Deitte and Omary in Acad Radiol 26:1417–1420, 2019) Design Thinking methodology, we conducted a two-part sequential explanatory qualitative study. Part 1 involved focus groups with stakeholders (n = 14) of the Health Science Education (HSED) Graduate Program at McMaster University (Hamilton, Canada). Part 2 entailed semi-structured interviews with learners (n = 11) in the HSED Program. An unconstrained approach to directed content analysis was used to analyze the data and construct themes.ResultsAn overarching theme of ‘the learner experience is an autonomous-supportive online learning environment’ was constructed, with two sub-themes: learner autonomy and building community.ConclusionLearners valued an autonomous-supportive online learning environment wherein they could tailor their educational experiences while also fostering a sense of community in the online environment. Future research should consider how a balance between maintaining autonomy in pacing learning and building community can be achieved to enhance the health professional learner experience in an online environment.

SOCIAL BULLYING IN NURSING AND HEALTH SCIENCES ACADEMIA: A QUALITATIVE STUDY.

Background: Academic social bullying in nursing and health professions schools is an understudied area yet emerging research shows it is prevalent. Purpose: This qualitative study derived from two larger quantitative studies targeting the development and validation of an instrument measuring academic social bullying and whose purpose was to understand the phenomenon in greater depth from narrative comments. Methods: Survey design with open ended questions was utilized to obtain content and construct validation along with reliability data for a de-novo instrument measuring academic social bullying. Over 250 nurse academics and 417 health sciences educators in baccalaureate and higher degree programs in the United States responded. This qualitative study focused on analysis of narrative comments (N = 91 nurse respondents and N = 89 health sciences faculty respondents, respectively) provided in response to open ended questions. Results: Five qualitative themes emerged from narrative content analysis. Qualitative themes approximated the construct-validated factors in the quantitative studies but also expanded on them. The themes included: Bullying experiences, faculty issues, issues of academia, student bullying of faculty, and general comments about bullying. Conclusion: Academic social bullying is a significant phenomenon for nursing and health sciences educators affecting faculty well-being. This study's qualitative findings can help enrich understanding of the problem and augment future quantitative and qualitative studies with the hope of developing targeted interventions.

The professional network underlying cerebral palsy intervention research based on systematic reviews and meta-analyses published in international journals: authors’ communities, institutional networks, and international collaboration

Cerebral palsy (CP) is a well-researched area of medical science, health science and special education. The growing number of publications every year makes difficult to monitor the progress of this research domain, therefore there is a broad interest for conducting systematic reviews and meta-analyses of interventions in international peer-reviewed scientific journals.Our goal is to analyze the scientific activity of authors who published systematic reviews and meta-analyses of CP intervention studies. To identify the active researchers, institutions, and countries, we used scientometric and bibliometric indicators that assess their productivity, collaborations, and the citations (utilization/usefulness of their studies), also paying attention to the institutional background and the network structure of national and international collaboration.We used Scopus to search for articles and included systematic reviews and meta-analyses of intervention studies, a total of 180 works, in our sample.Our results showed active and large communities of prolific authors and groups of authors with diverse institutional background. Most institutions are universities, hospitals, but we found various other organizations among them. Most of the universities are leading educational institutions according to international rankings; some of them are among the top-ranking ones. In geographical terms, the North American, Australian, and European regions are the most active and most interconnected ones. We assume organizations other than scientific collaboration networks also play a major role in the productivity and dissemination of scientific knowledge in this research area. As an example, we could mention the network, including the US, Australian and European registers. Authors living and working in the Far East, the Middle East or in South America also started to publish relevant articles in the 2010s. The research network structuring scientific knowledge in this area is flourishing.

The Effect of Using Anatomical Models in the Scope of Anatomy Course in Undergraduate Health Sciences Education on Academic Achievement of Students

Amaç: Bu araştırma, sağlık bilimleri lisans eğitiminde anatomi dersi kapsamında anatomik maketlerin kullanımının öğrencilerin akademik başarıları üzerine etkisinin değerlendirilmesi amacıyla yapılmıştır.Yöntem: Araştırma, Aydın Adnan Menderes Üniversitesi Sağlık Bilimleri ve Hemşirelik Fakültesinde yapılmıştır. Araştırmanın evrenini, bu Fakültelerin 2019-2020 veya 2021-2022 eğitim öğretim yılı güz dönemlerinde anatomi dersi almış olan birinci sınıf öğrencileri (N=1204), örneklemi ise çalışmaya dahil edilme kriterlerine uyan 580 öğrenci oluşturmuştur. Öğrencilerin anatomi dersi başarı notları ve demografik bilgileri üniversitenin öğrenci bilgi sisteminden (OBİS) alınmıştır. Verilerin normal dağılım gösterip göstermediği Kolmogorov-Smirnov testi ile not ortalamalarının karşılaştırması ise Student’s t testi ile yapılmıştır. Bulgular: Öğrencilerin %36.9’u Ebelik, %33.4’ü Çocuk Gelişimi ve %29.7’si Beslenme ve Diyetetik Bölümü öğrencisidir. 2019-2020 yılı güz dönemi öğrencilerinin anatomi dersi başarı not ortalaması (73.13±10.99), 2021-2022 yılı güz dönemi öğrencilerinin anatomi dersi başarı not ortalamalarından (64.45±12.14) daha yüksek olup bu farkın istatistiksel olarak anlamlı olduğu saptanmıştır (p<0.001).Sonuç: İki farklı dönemde anatomi dersi alan öğrencilerin anatomi başarı not ortalamalarının anatomi laboratuvarı öncesi grupta daha yüksek olduğu saptanmıştır. Pandemi nedeniyle ders saatlerinin kısaltılması, öğrencilerin derse devam zorunluluğunun kaldırılması gibi eğitim öğretimde yapılan bazı düzenlemelerin 2021-2022 yılı güz döneminde anatomi laboratuvarı kurulduktan sonra ders alan öğrencilerin başarı notunu düşürmüş olacağı kanaatine varılmıştır.

Innovation in Health Science Education: An Experiential Learning Program

Innovation in Health Science Education: An Experiential Learning Program

The Appearance of Digital Competence in the Work of Health Sciences Educators: A Cross-sectional Study.

The digital competence of health sciences educators is important for the delivery and development of modern education and lifelong learning. The aim of the study was to assess the appearance of digital competence in the work of Finnish health sciences educators and to determine whether educators' background factors are related to the areas of digital competence appearance. The European Framework for the Digital Competence of Educators was used as a theoretical background. The participants were Finnish health sciences educators (n = 388). Data were collected by quantitative survey and statistically analyzed. Results show that health sciences educators had participated in continuing education to develop their expertise and used a variety of digital methods and materials. Educators need more competence to improve healthcare students' ability to use digital technology. In the area of Teaching and Learning, educators younger than 40 years rated the appearance of digital competence as better than did those between the ages of 40 and 49 years. In the future, health sciences educators' basic and continuing education could take into account the competence requirements for digital competence, and educators' expertise must be increased in areas where digital competence does not appear strong.

Maximizing Opportunities for Anatomy Learning: Use of Authentic OSPE as Part of Assessment in Anatomy

In the care of patients, a practicing physician performs a selected and integrated set of individually skillful acts that are pertinent to each patient encounter. These include, for example, engaging the patient in a professional relationship, taking a clinical history, performing a mental and physical examination, performing, or initiating clinical tests or procedures, and undertaking diagnostic and therapeutic interventions. From an analytic perspective, these component acts of medical care reflect the generic competencies which comprise the practitioner’s basic clinical method1.Skill learning requires the demonstration of skill proficiency that must be observable. This observation is necessary to evaluate performance. Moreover, learners need repeated and deliberate practice followed by constructive feedback to continually refine and improve their performance of the skill. Therefore, the evaluation of skill proficiency requires the direct involvement of a trained observer, such as a supervising expert or an experienced patient2.The utility or value of assessment items (question used in an examination) depends on; their validity, reliability, educational impact, cost, and acceptability3. For instance, a written examination item had good value and utility if it tests learning in the knowledge domain. In the same way, a written examination item has poor utility if used for testing psychomotor skills.The so‐called OSPE (Objective Structured Practical Examination) has its origins in physiology4 where competence in performing physiological tests (e.g. Rinne’s test) are examined through observation by an examiner using a structured checklist (similar to Objective Structured Clinical Examination, OSCE). Within the context of medical education, an activity could be regarded as a clinical skill if it satisfies three conditions namely, the activity must be demonstrable, observable, and employs using knowledge, psychomotor and attitude components of learning (Fig 1).Anatomy learning in medical education underpins the development of clinical reasoning, understanding of medical imaging, the basis of clinical procedures, and physical examination of patients. An authentic utilization of the concept of OSPE in anatomy education should be in the context of evaluating a true skill competence. This will include evaluating competence in physical examination and/or clinical procedural skill (Fig 2). In current undergraduate medical education, these skills and more are now part of a comprehensive and integrated clinical skills curriculum.References AAMC, (2005). Recommendations for Clinical Skills Curricula for Undergraduate Medical Education. Association of American Medical Colleges. Duvivier et al. (2011) BMC Medical Education 11:101 Van der Vleuten CPM, (1996). Advances in Health Sciences Education 1 (1), 41‐67 Nayar U et al. (1986). Med Educ 20 (3):204‐9

Does Interdisciplinary Curriculum Improve Creativity? A Model Proposed for Health Sciences Education

A creative idea leads to innovation. Innovation brings new solutions to real-life problems. If it solves significant problems in people's life it generates revenue. Hence the innovation is a key to a country's economic growth. Our education system gives much importance to marks. Both teaching and learning are only oriented towards the examination. Our systems have rigid rules which gives less importance to personal creativity. Studies say that creativity may not be an innate trait and it can be triggered with well-defined pedagogical approaches. One such method is integrating curriculums. The interdisciplinary method of education is widely studied in various countries. It has been said that interdisciplinary education triggers the creativity of a student. (1–4) This paper reviews the method of integrating the curriculum. We propose a model for integrating the curriculum for health science students with technological advancements which can lead them to innovation.

Students’ Attitude Toward Active Learning in Health Science Education: The Good, the Challenges, and the Educational Field Differences

Active learning is an important shift in pedagogical paradigms in recent decades. Previous studies establish many benefits from this learning strategy. However, an implementation is challenging. This study aimed to clarify an explanation of the benefits and challenges of active learning from various educational field students’ perspectives. This study was conducted in a general education course at Chulalongkorn University. Underpinning with a mixed-method study, 22 undergraduates were interviewed in a focus group study. Results were analyzed with deductive thematic analysis and contributed to 23 items in close-ended questionnaires for a cross-sectional quantitative survey study. Notably, 222 undergraduates revealed their attitude toward active learning including benefits and challenges. Quantitative data were analyzed with analytical statistics including the Mann-Whitney U test, and these results are supported by thick descriptions derived from the qualitative data. This study revealed students’ attitude in benefits of active learning dividing into cognitive domain, student efficacy, and 21st century skills, and also challenges of active learning in teachers, students, and pedagogical aspects. Health science undergraduates tended to agree that active learning exposure enhances effective active learning than non-health science undergraduates (U = 2843, p = 0.029). An educational theory is also discussed with these results, and an educational implication to achieve an effective learning strategy is presented in this study.

Evaluating the Effects of Training to Improve Teaching Skills of Health Sciences Educators in Sudan.

PurposeThis evaluation draws evidence on the outcome of learning and teaching courses that were offered to a number of teaching staff (referred to as trainers) of the Academies of Health Sciences, Midwifery Schools and Centre for Continuous Professional Development in Sudan.MethodsThe evaluation was a cross-sectional, institution-based study conducted from October 2017 to January 2018 involving qualitative design. It consisted of direct observations of teaching, focus group discussions with students and semi-structured interviews with managers of teaching institutions.ResultsThe findings of direct observations revealed that the learning and teaching course has positive effects on the trainers’ ability to have clear, well-stated learning objectives; their presentation skills; and their use of different teaching methods. Moreover, the observations showed that trainers who attended the learning and teaching course now encourage the students to ask questions and are providing them with timely feedback about their learning. As students were the main beneficiaries for improved teaching, focus group discussions have shown that students were generally satisfied with trainers’ performance regarding the stated learning outcomes, curricula design, use of a range of teaching methods and assessment methods. During in-depth interviews, managers of training institutions expressed satisfaction with the trainers’ performance regarding the development of training materials, learners’ assessment, supervision, and evaluation of training.ConclusionShort courses on teaching and learning were a valuable investment for trainers, students, and the overall performance of health sciences training institutions. The evaluation revealed that trainers were able to apply what they have learnt. Moreover, students and managers noticed improvement in the performance of trainers in teaching, course delivery and assessment. It is recommended to expand, cascade and institutionalize the short courses on learning and teaching to all states to improve the capabilities of trainers, which would eventually contribute to the production of competent allied health professions in Sudan.

Health Students Perception of Online Learning Environment during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Survey on Quality of Online Learning in Indonesian University

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted the teaching and learning process at various universities, especially for health science students. Electronic learning (E-Learning) is applied as a core learning method to carry out learning during the pandemic. This study aimed at investigating health science students’ perception about the quality of their online learning during the pandemic. A mixed method research design was implemented in this current study. The modified version of Online Learning Environment Survey (OLES) was used as the main instrument to collect data from 390 health science students at 'Aisyiyah University in Yogyakarta consisting of seven study programs such as nursing, anesthesiology, midwifery, physiotherapy, nutrition, medical lab technology and radiology. Contrary assumption from the previous research, this study found that there were only slight differences between students from the seven study programs with regard to their perception of online learning. Majority of students agreed that during pandemic they have studied real cases and considered to be relevant to issues that occur outside the classroom. However, in health science education system where many courses are practical oriented, students confirmed that shifting completely to online mode may not be possible to enhance their skill to become a professional medical in the future. Therefore, it is prominent to design an effective curriculum for health science education system for the new normal.

Embodied teacher identity: a qualitative study on 'practical sense' as a basic pedagogical condition in times of Covid-19.

Worldwide, the Covid-19 pandemic has transformed teaching contexts rapidly. Studies on the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic have largely focused on students’ learning and well-being. In contrast, little is known about how emergency online teaching affects teachers. The aim of this study was to examine how disrupted teaching contexts during the Covid-19 pandemic affected academic teacher identities in health science education. Interviews were conducted with 19 experienced lecturers in health science education from two universities. Interview data were analysed using systematic text condensation. The established codes were compared across interviews to identify common themes and subsequently synthesized into descriptions of the emerging phenomena. Findings indicated that a form of embodied teacher identity, i.e. internalized teaching practices turned into dispositions, constituted a basic pedagogical condition and a resource for the teachers, and that the sudden change in the teaching context caused a loss of teacher identity. This identity loss was related to an incorporated understanding and use of the teacher’s sense of the classroom (subtheme 1), non-verbal feedback from students (subtheme 2) and reciprocal visual contact (subtheme 3). Data also indicated that teachers’ ability to adapt their teaching to students’ needs while teaching and teachers’ motivation and job satisfaction may have suffered. Universities should carefully consider how to cultivate sustainable and adaptive teacher identities compatible with the increasing digitalization of learning environments. Teaching is an embodied affair, and teacher identities are sensitive to structural changes in teaching contexts.

Differentiated effects of COVID-19 on university students

The confinement due to the coronavirus had effects after implementing virtual education at all educational levels. To identify the students' perception about the teaching-learning conditions that prevailed during COVID-19, distinguishing those that allowed them to continue learning from those that did not work in the academic areas of higher education in health sciences. And economic-administrative, exploratory, descriptive and correlational research was carried out with students from the Universidad Veracruzana de México. The sample consisted of 665 non-probabilistic and non-random with a general population. It was inquired about the teacher's teaching activities, learning, academic interaction, digital knowledge, new understanding acquired, socio-emotional difficulties experienced and management strategies, and the technological resources and connectivity used. Among other results, it was found that students from the first semesters and women were the populations most likely to put metacognitive skills into practice.

A call to reform undergraduate nursing clinical placements

A call to reform undergraduate nursing clinical placements