Medical Science Educator最新文献

Purpose: We evaluated the perspectives of medical students on the roles of formative assessments (FAs) and their impact on academic performance, with the goal of identifying areas for improvement.

Methods: This cross-sectional study assessed the perspectives of students related to congruence, authenticity, consultation, transparency, and accommodation. Additionally, it explored students' preferences for FA, the usefulness of FA, and students' views and ideas on the effects of summative assessments (SAs) on their learning. A survey consisting of 36 items was distributed to medical students in their second and third years of medical school.

Results: Most of the 40 participating students had a positive attitude toward their perceptions of FA, ranging from 78.13% to 93.33%. In addition, the students expressed that FA was beneficial to their academic experience. There were varying viewpoints on the level of stress caused by FA and which specific aspects of FA could be enhanced.

Conclusions: FAs were feasible and beneficial. Most students viewed FAs favorably because they promoted learning experiences and achievements, and helped identify support needs for SAs, despite some concerns about them being time-consuming and stressful. The use of SAs facilitated better study strategies. However, potential improvements to FAs regarding the feedback process, assessment schedules, and alignment with teaching objectives were suggested to increase their usefulness.

This pilot study examined students' trust in artificial intelligence (AI)-generated feedback using Microsoft Copilot in a master's-level pharmacy course. Thirty-six students, divided into nine groups, participated in two peer-feedback sessions. AI feedback was optional: 67% of groups used it in the first session and 56% in the second. Survey data showed that 60% of students found AI feedback clear, but only 40% found it useful. In contrast, peer feedback was consistently rated more relevant and actionable. Many students cited trust and quality concerns. Findings support the need for improved AI prompt design, training, and integration as a complementary feedback method.

Supplementary information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40670-025-02440-6.

The evolution of health professions education has increased reliance on learning and development specialists for creating new instructional and curricular resources. To facilitate collaboration between health professions educators (HPE) and these instructional specialists, we present a transdisciplinary model called Agile eVidence-Informed Design (AVIDesign). Traditional systematic design processes can be cumbersome for HP educators, resulting in a need for more adaptable approaches. AVIDesign builds on established systematic and agile design principles to improve practical application in health professions education. AVIDesign steps correlate with the familiar steps used in the practice of evidence-based medicine (EBM) used for patient care. Three detailed design cases illustrate step-by-step applications of this model in health professions education, demonstrating how it supports real-world curriculum development in diverse instructional settings.

Introduction: Prior research in education has identified that causal mechanistic reasoning (CMR) can enhance understanding of causal relationships and support the construction of explanations and predictions. However, the literature lacks information about how CMR is used among medical students or in pharmacology education. This study investigated how medical students utilize CMR to predict and explain adverse drug effects (ADE) as a pharmacological phenomenon.

Methods: Pre-clerkship osteopathic medical students enrolled at a large American university were asked to predict and explain their reasoning related to adverse effects caused by SGLT2 inhibitors. Their responses guided the development of a coding scheme to characterize the degree to which students used CMR. Pearson's chi-squared tests were applied to analyze the presence and strength of the relationships between overall ADE predictions and the type of CMR used.

Results: Sixty-seven percent of the students (N = 88) correctly identified urogenital infections as a possible ADE caused by SGLT2 inhibitors; however, only 25% provided a fully causal mechanistic account. However, we identified a significant association of large effect size between using CMR and correctly predicting the ADE (χ ² = 56.129, p-value < 0.001, Cramer's V = 0.799).

Conclusion: CMR can be a useful tool for supporting medical students' understanding of pharmacological phenomena and solidifying students' learning toward an effective application in future clinical practice. This research highlights how more integrative, mechanism-focused curricula may be a promising area of future research in pharmacology education research.

Graphical abstract: How students employ mechanistic reasoning to connect foundational biomedical sciences (e.g., physiology, microbiology, biochemistry) with core pharmacological concepts, such as pharmacodynamics, to think through the potential adverse effects of a drug class (SGLT2 inhibitor). Causal mechanistic reasoning (CMR) can be used to understand how students use their knowledge of the underlying entities to explain a phenomenon and address pharmacology-specific questions.

Supplementary information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40670-025-02432-6.

The pedagogical application of design thinking in higher education has increased in recent years. Many higher education institutions apply design thinking to acquaint students with user-centred approaches for problem-solving. We consider a problem identified in an evaluation of experiences in implementing design thinking in a master's-level course, where it was discovered that student designers had limited experience in qualitative interviewing skills, which compromised the quality of user engagement. We provide a potential solution for design thinking courses to improve user interviewing. Accordingly, we make curriculum framework and faculty development suggestions. Lastly, we suggest a research agenda to coincide with this solution.

Vanderbilt University School of Medicine (VUSM) aims to catalyze the advancement of impactful discovery, servant leadership, and lifelong learning. During a curriculum revision, VUSM fostered lifelong learning by intentionally integrating a portfolio coaching program into a competency-based curriculum. At matriculation, each student is paired with a faculty coach, and the dyads meet at regularly scheduled intervals until graduation. The program is designed to inspire and support students in reaching their full potential, assist students in creating and meeting academic goals, and support informed self-assessment to facilitate self-regulation and lifelong learning. With over 10 years of continuous refinement and extensive student participation data, this stands as one of the most mature and comprehensive undergraduate medical education coaching programs. This manuscript describes the implementation, institutional experience, and outcomes of the VUSM Portfolio Coaching Program.

Introduction: Since the first high-stakes exams of medical school can promote anxiety and impede assessment for learning, it is important to evaluate programs designed to address these issues. We studied the impact of an exam "safety net" program (SNP), which enabled low-scoring students to raise their score via a learning exercise, on class-wide exam performance and the student's perception of assessment for learning and wellness.

Methods: A SNP was implemented in the AY22-23 and AY23-24 Foundations course for our two summative mid-term exams. The SNP was not offered for the comprehensive final exam. We compared class-wide aggregated non-adjusted Foundations exam data from the AY21-22 class (no intervention) to the intervention classes. The SNP's impact on students' perception of assessment and the learning environment was analyzed via anonymous surveys and two focus groups.

Results: Non-adjusted mean scores on Foundations mid-term and final exams for classes with the SNP were slightly higher than the AY21-22 class. Low-scoring students who participated in the SNP learning exercise exhibited an increase in scores on subsequent Foundations exams greater than the class as a whole. Students perceived the SNP to be associated with mastery learning, study strategy experimentation, a low-anxiety introduction to the testing process, and collaborative learning among students and faculty.

Discussion: The impact of remediation on struggling students has been well-studied. Less attention has been paid to the class-wide impact of SNPs on the learning environment. Our SNP was associated with favorable student perceptions of the learning environment in the transition to medical school, without compromising performance on exam-based knowledge metrics.

Supplementary information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40670-025-02436-2.

Background: The International Collaboration and Exchange Program (ICEP) and other similar exchange programs can play a crucial role in preparing future health profession students to become global healthcare leaders through virtual exchanges and in-person academic immersion travels (AIT). Recognizing the need to enhance interpersonal skills, the traditional classroom style of teaching may require reassessment. Our study aims to explore ICEP's impact on participants, specifically their professional identity (PI) levels, to shed light on the effects of virtual and hybrid exchange programs.

Methods: Health profession students from 20 universities across four continents (n = 302) who participated in the ICEP program in 2022-2023 responded to an online, validated Professional Self Identity Questionnaire (PSIQ) both at the program's initiation and upon its conclusion to assess their self-perceived levels of PI. Statistical analysis was performed using RStudio Version 2023.3.0.386 (2023).

Results: Analyzing the group of students before (PI = 3.63 (1.52)) and after (PI = 3.97 (1.48)) completing two semesters of virtual exchanges within ICEP revealed that students exhibited higher senses of PI upon the program's completion (p < 0.001). Additionally, the group of students that participated in the 1-week AIT (PI = 4.19 (1.57)) was also found to have a heightened sense of PI compared to students who did not (PI = 3.88 (1.43)) (p < 0.05).

Conclusion: Through the exchanges facilitated by ICEP, students had the opportunity to reinforce their sense of PI. Such exchange programs warrant further exploration for their potential to innovatively integrate professional skills development into health profession education-a valuable aspect in shaping a well-rounded provider.

While there has been an explosion of interest in the use of generative AI (GenAI) applications in medical education over the past 2 years, relatively little is understood about how health professions students are using this technology. This study aimed to answer these questions by surveying students about their GenAI use. Unsurprisingly, this survey revealed that many students were indeed using these applications, most often for information retrieval.