Journal of medical education
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The study on which this article is based evaluated the effect of a clerkship in anesthesiology on medical students' attitudes toward anesthesiology as a specialty, the role of anesthesiologists as physicians, career choice, and the usefulness of this experience in their learning. Eighty-four participating students filled out questionnaires on the first and the last day of a four-week clerkship. Responses to common questions in the questionnaires administered before and after the clerkship were compared by paired t-test to determine statistical significance. The results suggest that the clerkship (a) significantly improved graduating students' attitudes toward anesthesiologists as physicians and (b) provided a worthwhile clinical experience.
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Two parallel studies were conducted with junior medical students to determine what influence the forms of lecture notes would have on learning. The three types of notes given to the students were: a comprehensive manuscript of the lecture containing text, tables, and figures; a partial handout which included some illustrations but required substantial annotation by the students; and a skeleton outline containing no data from the lecture. The students' knowledge about the subject was measured before the lecture, immediately after the lecture, two to four weeks later, and approximately three months later. ⋯ By contract, the students' performances on tests generally were better for those who had received the partial or skeleton handout formats. This was particularly true for information presented during the last quarter of each lecture, when learning efficiency of the skeleton handout group increased while the other two handout groups exhibited learning fatigue. It was concluded that learning by medical students was improved when they recorded notes in class.