Clinical Skills Training in Primary Care Settings Improves Perception of Preparedness for Clinical...

Clinical skills training in primary care settings improves perception of preparedness for clinical rotations without impacting on skillsassessmentMarch 3, 2010 at 1:47 am (articles) Authors: D Widyandana, G D Majoor, A J J A ScherpbierBackground Early clinical exposure of medical students is supposed to improve preparation for prospective clinical rotations. Hence, students prepared exclusively in a skills laboratory were compared with peers for whom part of their skills training programme was substituted by training in a primary health centre (PHC).Summary of work Over a 5-week period 153 fourth-year (pre-clinical) medical students trained clinical skills exclusively in a skills lab; 59 of their peers received a mixed programme of laboratory trainings and practice in PHC. Students perception of preparedness and clinical skills achievement were assessed through the Preparation for Hospital Practice Questionnaire (PHPQ) and a 9-station OSCE exam.Summary of results Students taking the mixed programme felt significantly better prepared for clinical rotations than exclusively skills lab-trained peers. Mean OSCE scores of both groups did not differ significantly. Students preparedness scores did not correlate with their General Point Average (GPA) and OSCE scores.Conclusion Adding clinical skills training in a PHC setting to skills lab trainings improved students perception of preparedness for clinical rotations. However, this mixed programme did not improve students clinical and academic performance. Take home message Early clinical encounters may improve students perception of preparedness for clinical rotations. However, tangible impact on clinical and academic performance remains to be demonstrated.Accepted As: Oral Presentationin OTTAWA Conference 2010, Miami, Florida, USfurther information, please contact: widyandana@yahoo.comPermalink Leave a Comment INTEGRATING CLINICAL SKILLS TRAINING IN SKILLS LABORATORY AND PRIMARY HEALTH CARE SETTINGS TO PREPARE MEDICAL STUDENTS ENTERING HOSPITALCLERKSHIPMarch 3, 2010 at 1:37 am (articles) 1D. Widyandana, 2G.D. Majoor, 2A.J.J.A. Scherpbier 1 Dept. Medical Education & Skills Lab, Faculty of Medicine, Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia2Institute for Education, Faculty of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The NetherlandsKeywords:Clinical skills training, preparation, undergraduate students, primary care, attachment programIntroductionUndergraduate medical students can practice their clinical skills in a skills laboratory when a school has this facility. Finishing pre-clinical phase, the students enter clinical rotations in real clinical setting. Current studies show that transition process from campus into real clinical setting can cause problems for students, they often feel anxious and not prepared enough to face real patients in reality. Integrating skills training between skills laboratory and primary health care setting could be a solution for this problem.ObjectiveTo show the effects of clinical attachment program with integrated skills training in Primary Health Care (PHC) settings on students level of preparedness to enter clinical rotation.Method59 undergraduate medical students in Faculty of Medicine, Gadjah Mada University, Indonesia, randomly choosen to practice their clinical skills in PHC setting before entering clerkship for 5 weeks (11 days). Preparation for Hospital Practice Questionnaire (Hill et al, 1998) will be used for pretest and post test to assess students level of preparedness entering clerkship, that consists of interpersonal skills, confident, collaboration, management, science, prevention, holistic care, and self directed learning. The clinical supervisor assesses students improvements 5 times during attachments program in PHC.ResultFinishing clinical attachment in PHCs, students have significant improvement in their sense of preparedness entering clinical rotations (p