BMC medical education
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BMC medical education · Oct 2017
Validation of the 5-item doctor-patient communication competency instrument for medical students (DPCC-MS) using two years of assessment data.
Medical students on clinical rotations have to be assessed on several competencies at the end of each clinical rotation, pointing to the need for short, reliable, and valid assessment instruments of each competency. Doctor patient communication is a central competency targeted by medical schools however, there are no published short (i.e. less than 10 items), reliable and valid instruments to assess doctor-patient communication competency. The Faculty of Medicine of Laval University recently developed a 5-item Doctor-Patient Communication Competency instrument for Medical Students (DPCC-MS), based on the Patient Centered Clinical Method conceptual framework, which provides a global summative end-of-rotation assessment of doctor-patient communication. We conducted a psychometric validation of this instrument and present validity evidence based on the response process, internal structure and relation to other variables using two years of assessment data. ⋯ The DPCC-MS provides an internally consistent and valid assessment of medical students' communication with patients.
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BMC medical education · Oct 2017
Observational StudyDepression in medical students: insights from a longitudinal study.
Factors associated with depression of medical students are poorly understood. The purpose of this study is to determine the prevalence of depression in medical students, its change during the course, if depression persists for affected students, what are the factors associated with depression and how these factors change over time. ⋯ Our findings suggest that personal factors (anxiety traits, medicine choice factors, relationship patterns and academic burnout) are relevant for persistence of high levels of BDI during medical training. Medical schools need to identity students who experience depression and support then, as early as possible, particularly when depression has been present over time.
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BMC medical education · Oct 2017
A novel bedside cardiopulmonary physical diagnosis curriculum for internal medicine postgraduate training.
Physicians spend less time at the bedside in the modern hospital setting which has contributed to a decline in physical diagnosis, and in particular, cardiopulmonary examination skills. This trend may be a source of diagnostic error and threatens to erode the patient-physician relationship. We created a new bedside cardiopulmonary physical diagnosis curriculum and assessed its effects on post-graduate year-1 (PGY-1; interns) attitudes, confidence and skill. ⋯ A comprehensive bedside cardiopulmonary physical diagnosis curriculum improved trainee attitudes, confidence and skill in the cardiopulmonary examination. These results provide an opportunity to re-examine the way physical examination is taught and assessed in residency training programs.
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BMC medical education · Sep 2017
Psychological distress among medical students in conflicts: a cross-sectional study from Syria.
Medical education can be a time of great psychological distress for students. The ongoing Syrian conflict represents an additional factor potentially contributing to poor mental health among medical students. Studies revealed high levels of psychological distress among Syrians. We aimed to investigate the prevalence and risk factors of depression, anxiety and stress among medical students at Damascus University during this period of war. ⋯ We concluded that Syrian medical students suffer from high rates of psychological distress. Females, second-year students, and those with "insufficient" personal income were the most affected. Students' perception of their own financial status, rather than the financial status per se was related to psychological distress. There was no evidence of a direct relationship between the ongoing conflict and psychological distress. Further investigations of causes and consequences of poor mental health in Syrian medical students are essential.
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BMC medical education · Sep 2017
Frontline learning of medical teaching: "you pick up as you go through work and practice".
Few medical teachers have received formal teaching education. Along with individual and organizational barriers to participation in teacher training programs, increasing numbers and altered distribution of physicians away from major teaching centers have increased the difficulty of attendance. Furthermore, it is not known if traditional faculty development formats are the optimal learning options given findings from existing studies document both positive and negative outcomes. There is a gap in research that explores how medical teachers learn to teach and also limited research regarding how medical teachers actually teach. The purpose of this study was to provide insight into how physicians describe their teaching of trainees, and the nature of their teaching development and improvement to inform faculty development programs. ⋯ The findings suggested that the participants' major resource for learning how to teach was informal experiential learning, both in and out of the workplace. This may have implications for faculty development strategies for medical teaching education.