Advances in Health Sciences Education最新文献

Inclusion of patient age and sex in single best answer (SBA) questions is standard practice, whereas ethnicity is typically included only when considered clinically relevant. This selective use may inadvertently cue students or introduce bias. This study examined whether including patient ethnicity in SBA questions influences student performance, response time and item psychometric properties. A prospective randomised controlled study was conducted using two versions of a final-year formative assessment. In each version, approximately half of the questions included the patient's ethnicity, while the corresponding questions in the alternate version omitted this information. Students were randomly assigned to one of the two exam versions. Two hundred and sixty-seven final-year medical students participated in the study. The mean score for questions without ethnicity was 80.3% and for questions with ethnicity was 79.8% (mean difference = -0.5 pp, p = 0.12). On average, students spent 1.6 seconds longer to answer questions with ethnicity compared to questions without ethnicity (p < 0.01). In SBA questions with and without ethnicity, there was no significant difference in mean facility (79.8% vs. 80.3%, p = 0.17) or mean item-total score point-biserial correlation (0.20 vs. 0.21, p = 0.63). These indicate that including patient ethnicity did not significantly impact overall student performance or mean item-level psychometric properties. However, it was associated with longer response times, suggesting a small but significant increase in cognitive load. Educators involved in assessment design should carefully consider this added cognitive burden when deciding whether to include patient ethnicity in future assessments.

Background: In health professions education, cultivating commitment to collaborative practice is essential. However, collective dedication as a desired outcome in interprofessional education (IPE) often remains overlooked. Psychological factors contributing to team members' collective dedication are poorly understood within health professions collaborative learning environments. This study examined relationships among team psychological factors (interdependence, relatedness, efficacy, and potency) and their influence on collective dedication in an IPE context.

Method: Data were from 236 undergraduate students (Chinese medicine, Law, Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, Speech Therapy, and Social Work) who attended an IPE simulation at a higher education institution in Hong Kong. Participants completed a set of standardized questionnaires adapted to the IPE context, assessing positive interdependence, sense of relatedness, collective efficacy, group potency, and collective dedication. The data were analyzed using correlational and path analysis.

Results: Findings showed that positive interdependence positively predicted students' sense of relatedness, collective efficacy, and group potency. Further, sense of relatedness positively predicted collective efficacy, group potency, and collective dedication. Further, collective efficacy and group potency positively predicted collective dedication. Lastly, collective efficacy mediated the association between group potency and collective dedication.

Conclusions: This study advances health professions education by examining the pathways to collective dedication in IPE. Positive interdependence indirectly affects collective dedication through students' sense of relatedness, group potency, and collective efficacy. The findings provide practical implications of the findings for health professions educators and IPE program implementers.

While it's commonplace in medical education to train learners using simulated patient encounters, task trainers, or by practicing skills on healthy volunteers, little is known about how well learning and skills transfer to patient care. The purpose of this research is to quantify Point-of-Care Ultrasound (POCUS) skill transfer to patient care through performance assessment. A quantitative analysis of aggregated data consisting of image quality of student-performed POCUS examinations from one midwestern Physician Assistant program was performed. Probabilities for scores of 1-2, 3, 4, and 5 were estimated using a multivariable cumulative logit model. Forty-six PA students were included in the study. A total of 6,218 POCUS examinations were included; 4,506 on non-patients, and 1,712 on patients. When evaluating skill transfer from non-patients to patients, the probability of obtaining a high-quality examination decreases significantly, with a more substantial decrease in performance on more complex skills. The probability of a high-quality examination on the twenty-fifth examination was the highest when learning transfer happened earlier. While training medical providers using non-patient experiences is common, educators must understand the significant loss of quality upon skills transfer to patient care. More complex or higher risk skills likely require close monitoring at the point of skill transfer, to support the learner and ensure patient safety. Based on the findings of this research, earlier skill transfer is associated with worse immediate performance but better long-term re-learning outcomes. Increased deliberate practice prior to skill transfer is associated with better first-time performance on actual patients.

Undergraduate interprofessional education aims to prepare health professions students for a future work field characterised by wicked problems demanding interprofessional collaboration (IPC). Interprofessional identity (IPI) has been suggested as key to IPC, but how to foster its formation remains underdeveloped. Therefore, we aimed to identify (1) the main characteristics of IPI and (2) guidelines for educational design fostering interprofessional identity formation (IPIF). Per critical review methodology, we analysed educational sciences, health professions education and management sciences literature. The results of two iterative, non-exhaustive literature searches were analysed through reflexive thematic analysis. The first search focused on conceptualisations of IPI to identify its main characteristics and theories explaining IPIF, the second on the mechanisms of these theories fostering IPIF to derive guidelines for educational design. Analysis of the first search yielded five themes characterising IPI: (1) sense of belonging to an interprofessional team; (2) commitment to working interprofessionally; (3) values, attitudes, beliefs, and ethics related to IPC; (4) knowledge and understanding of roles, responsibilities, and expertise; and (5) IPC skills. We identified five prevalent theories explaining IPIF. Analysis of the second search resulted in guidelines for educational design fostering IPIF targeting the student, interprofessional team, faculty, and curriculum. Fostering IPI alongside IPC competencies is crucial for preparing students for IPC. This critical review highlighted key characteristics of IPI and proposes ED-IPIF, a theory-based framework for fostering IPIF through integrated educational design. Future research should address existing gaps and empirically test the ED-IPIF through longitudinal studies and robust tools for measuring IPI.