Roaming Land of Unknown: Making Sense of Medical Learning in a Traditional, Pre-clinical Curriculum

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: During dedicated 1st and 2nd years of medical learning, students routinely learn the pathophysiology, general management and treatment of specific diseases. However, students do not receive any hands-on clinical training to apply that knowledge when their clinical rotations start.

Early clinical exposure would help to relieve stress of the students pertaining to patient handling, developing real-time clinical reasoning, communication skills, professional attitude and patient empathy. The transition between the theoretical and the clinical phase of undergraduate medical education has often been characterised as the most stressful period of undergraduate medical education.

OBJECTIVES

1. To assess the views of medical students on making Early Clinical Exposure (ECE) a part of Integrated Modular Curriculum to better integrate Basic and Applied Medical Knowledge.
2. To assess the views on benefits and drawbacks of ECE.
3. To assess how specifically 3rd year medical students feel equipped when first exposed to a clinical setting.

MATERIALS AND METHODS:

A cross sectional study was conducted among the students of 3rd, 4th, and 5th year MBBS in Rawalpindi Medical University from Aug, 2021 to May, 2022. A Self Structured Questionnaire was used as the data collection tool. Data was analysed using SPSS v22. Chi square test, mean, and standard deviation were applied.

RESULTS:The majority of students 80% (n=240/300) responded that Early Clinical Exposure (ECE) be made part of Modular Curriculum to better integrate Basic and Applied Medical Knowledge. 78% of students responded that ECE would have prepared them better for clinical years 47.3% strongly agreed that ECE would be an enjoyable method for learning as it would break the monotony of didactic lectures and would also help in better understanding of medical learning but 31.3% responded that ECE would be time consuming.

DISCUSSIONS AND CONCLUSIONS:

ECE is an emerging need of the time. Clinical years’ students believe that their understanding and performance in pre-clinical years would have been significantly better were they to have an exposure of clinical environment. Pertaining to students’ worries on ECE being time consuming and only adding burden, it would need to undergo extensive research so as to best inculcate it in curriculum that is feasible for staff and students alike.

KEY WORDS: Curriculum (D003479), Education (D004493), Hospital (D006761), Medical School (D012577), Early Clinical Exposure (ECE)