Goble, M. and Chapman, N. orcid.org/0000-0002-4853-2909 (2023) Development and evaluation of an online surgical elective for medical students. BMC Medical Education, 23 (1). 254. ISSN 1472-6920
Abstract
Background Decreased experiential learning opportunities exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic have increased development of online surgical educational courses. To what extent may such courses provide exposure to broad and accessible surgical education?
Methods Surge is a 6-week online surgical elective hosted within a virtual learning environment, covering all surgical specialties. Course content is mapped to the Royal College of Surgeons’ Undergraduate Curriculum in Surgery. Each week consultant surgeons discuss their specialty in short videos on anatomy, pathology and lifestyle of a surgeon. Students also engage with learning activities; further reading lists; formative quizzes and live sessions including suturing practice. Participants were medical students undertaking third-year electives at the University of Sheffield. Pre- and post-course questionnaires investigated student interest in surgery, understanding of steps required to pursue a surgical career and confidence in surgical environments. Qualitative data was collected via free-text responses and analysed with content analysis. Quantitative data was collected using 5-point Likert scales (1 = Strongly Disagree; 5 = Strongly Agree) and analysed using the Wilcoxon signed-rank test.
Results Twenty-two students participated in Surge over five 6-week cohorts. Examination of free-text responses revealed students gained increased understanding of available surgical career options. Students felt better informed regarding different surgical specialties (median score 2.5 vs. 4, p = 0.000) and steps required to develop a surgical portfolio (median score 2 vs. 5, p = 0.000). Additionally, confidence in understanding of relevant intraoperative steps improved (median score 3 vs. 4, p = 0.000).
Conclusion These data demonstrate Surge increased student confidence and understanding of surgical careers despite reduced in-person opportunities to engage with surgical education. Surge will continue to be developed and evaluated on a larger scale.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2023 The Authors. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
Keywords: | Surgical Education; Online learning; Medical undergraduate curriculum; Surgical Elective; Virtual elective surgery; E-Learning |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health (Sheffield) > The Medical School (Sheffield) > Division of Genomic Medicine (Sheffield) > Department of Oncology and Metabolism (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 25 Apr 2023 13:22 |
Last Modified: | 02 Oct 2024 11:00 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Springer Science and Business Media LLC |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1186/s12909-023-04180-w |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:198502 |