Medical schools in the United States are encouraged to prepare and certify the entrustment of medical students to perform 13 core entrustable professional activities (EPAs) prior to graduation.
The clinical assessment of medical students in the emergency department (ED) is a highly variable process in which clerkship directors (CD) create and use institution-specific tools, many with unproven reliability or validity, to assess students of differing experience and from different institutions.
Volume 16, Issue 6, November 2015.
Andrew Lichtenheld, BS, et al.
Podcasts, episodic digital audio recordings downloaded
through web syndication or streamed online, have
been shown to be an effective instructional method in
undergraduate health professions education, and are
increasingly used for self-directed learning. Emergency
medicine (EM) has embraced podcasting: over 80% of
EM residents report listening to podcasts and a substantial
number identify podcasts as the most valuable use
of their educational time.Despite proven efficacy in
undergraduate medical education and remarkable popularity
with EM residents and attendings, there remain few EM
podcasts targeted to medical students. Given that podcast
effectiveness correlates with how well content matches the
listener needs, a podcast specific to EM-bound medical
students may optimally engage this target audience.
Volume 16, Issue 6, November 2015.
Amanda L. Webb, MS, et al.
Introduction: Medical educators in recent years have been using social media for more
penetrance to technologically-savvy learners. The utility of using Twitter for curriculum content
delivery has not been studied. We sought to determine if participation in a social media-based
educational supplement would improve student performance on a test of clinical images at the end
of the semester.
Methods: 116 second-year medical students were enrolled in a lecture-based clinical medicine
course, in which images of common clinical exam findings were presented. An additional, optional
assessment was performed on Twitter. Each week, a clinical presentation and physical exam image
(not covered in course lectures) were distributed via Twitter, and students were invited to guess the
exam finding or diagnosis. After the completion of the course, students were asked to participate in a
slideshow “quiz” with 24 clinical images, half from lecture and half from Twitter.
Results: We conducted a one-way analysis of variance to determine the effect Twitter participation
had on total, Twitter-only, and lecture-only scores. Twitter participation data was collected from the
end-of-course survey and was defined as submitting answers to the Twitter-only questions “all or
most of the time”, “about half of the time”, and “little or none of the time.” We found a significant
difference in overall scores (p<0.001) and in Twitter-only scores (p<0.001). There was not enough
evidence to conclude a significant difference in lecture-only scores (p=0.124). Students who
submitted answers to Twitter “all or most of the time” or “about half the time” had significantly higher
overall scores and Twitter-only scores (p<0.001 and p<0.001, respectively) than those students who
only submitted answers “little or none of the time.”
Conclusion: While students retained less information from Twitter than from traditional classroom
lecture, some retention was noted. Future research on social media in medical education would
benefit from clear control and experimental groups in settings where quantitative use of social media
could be measured. Ultimately, it is unlikely for social media to replace lecture in medical curriculum;
however, there is a reasonable role for social media as an adjunct to traditional medical education.
