Strides in Development of Medical Education Journal
Year:2005 | Volume:1 | Issue:2|Papers Count:8

Background: Cheating among university students is highly common so that some experts have described it as "epidemic".Objective: To determine the opinion of medical students in one of medical universities towards cheating and to estimate its frequency.Methods: A self-administered questionnaire, content valid and reliable, was distributed among medical students (between years 1 to 6) at the end of lectures. They were asked to estimate the frequency of cheating among their classmates, and to show whether or not they approve the cheating behavior types on a likert scale.Results: Of three hundred and two students participated in the study, an replied. 68% of respondents were female and the rest were male. The range of the students in each level was 31 persons (level three) to 85 ones (the sixth level). According to the findings, "attendance of another person in the exam session" was the most rejected cheating type (x-=4.13) and the most approved type of cheating was "not informing the teacher about the wrong higher score" (x- =2.63).A considerable rate of students (about 50%) approved some types of cheating. The relative frequency of some types of cheating has been estimated to about 50%. Comparing the students opinions showed no significant difference in terms of sex.Conclusion: Paying attention to cheating among students is necessary.

Background: Nowadays, since a hard educational competition can be seen among students, exam anxiety is increasing. Anxiety causes concentration deviation, so that data processing will decrease. Also previous studies have shown pessimistic thoughts make the students to expect failure, so that the student can not concentrate on the exam, and as a result he will not get a positive result.Objective: To determine the level of students' exam anxiety in Fatemeh (P.B.U.H) College of Nursing and Midwifery.Methods: This analytic descriptive study was done on 317 students educating in Fatemeh College of Nursing and Midwifery. A questionnaire consisting of 24 background questions and Silberberg's anxiety test with 32 questions were used to gather the data. These questionnaires were given to the students in the exam salon before the final exam. Measures of central tendency dispersion index, t-test and one way ANOVA were used to analyze the data.Results: The findings showed that 90.9% of the students had anxiety in low level. 6.4% had in medium level and 1.7% had a high level anxiety. The mean (±standard deviation) of exam anxiety of the students was 25.76% (±16.59). The mean (±standard deviation) of exam anxiety among the nursing students was 25.2 (±16.45) and among the midwifery students. it was 26.78 (±16.9), but no significant difference was found between exam anxiety in terms of major (p>0.05). A significant difference was observed in anxiety level, in terms of sex marital status, parent's education and the number of siblings.Conclusion: Using consultation strategies and making a friendly intervention between students and teachers is recommended for the students with high level of test anxiety to identify the problems and try to solve them. To relieve anxiety, consultation interventions by specialists relaxation using comics and jokes in exams will be helpful.

Background: From two centuries ago, scholarship systems in many countries have supported postgraduate students to continue their studies abroad. Nonetheless, due to the fundamental revolution in the concepts of scientific development in last decades, scholarship systems have modified their missions particularly in developed countries.Objective: To express some practical guidelines to improve the scholarship system in Iran, this study compared scholarship systems in developed and developing countries in terms of their rules and regulations. The main questions were about the objectives of scholarship systems, the selection methods of eligible students, and how they encourage students to come back their home countries.Methods: This was a qualitative study; data were collected by exploring written documents, websites, and interviewing 40 PhD students from 16 countries who were studying in UK universities.Results: Obtaining certificate to get higher academic position was the main objective of developing country students; however, scholarship systems in developed countries were aimed to push students to understand others' cultures and scientific styles, and address research questions during their studies. In addition, there were well established collaborations between developed countries and their organization in supporting students. These types of collaborations were not seen developing countries.Conclusion: By looking at the advantages of scholarship systems in developed countries, it is suggested that we need to amend the objectives of scholarship system in Iran and formulate a new plan to optimize the method in selecting students, decreasing brain drain, and activating private section and NGOs.

Background: According to the educational policy and regulation, offering academic advising to the students is one of the essential faculty members' responsibilities and medical universities must guide the students during their education in order to prevent any academic problems and barriers and improve academic achievement.Objective: To Compare the effect of two educational methods on academic advisors' knowledge, attitude and practice.Methods: Eighty-seven advisors participated in this experimental study. The participants were randomly divided into two groups. The first group (N=43) receiving self-learning educational materials participated in a one-day workshop. The second group only received self-learning educational materials. A reliable and valid questionnaire was distributed to gather data.Results: The findings indicated the knowledge of the advisors about advising and counseling in the first group (x- =14.77, SD=3.1) was higher than the advisors in the second group (x- =11.54, SD=2.76), so that a significant difference was observed between the two groups (P<0.001). But attitude and practice of the advisors in the two groups showed no significant difference.Conclusion: According to this study, holding planned workshops, role playing method and group discussion work will cause active and dynamic learning rather than receiving self-learning materials. These research findings can help plan advisors education.

Background: The pre-internship (PI) exam is the most important examination of medical students which can assess their abilities in passing the general medicine.Objective: To determine the effective factors on the pre-internship score and result at Zahedan University of Medical Sciences.Methods: The research was a cross-sectional on 63 medical students participating in preinternship examinations in Zahedan University of Medical Sciences in 2000. The mean scores of basic sciences, physiopathology, clinical, total and the scores of ten important courses of preinternship exam and the demographic variables were recorded and analyzed.Results: The failing rate was 20.4%, the relative risks of failing were 3.6, 3.7, 6.1, 10.9 and 11.6 for the students with non-district group in quota system, high age, more than 5.5 year education period (to pre-internship), with clinical score mean and total mean lower than the mean of all participants, respectively and it was significant. Also, the mean of pre-internship scores was significantly different based on marital status, situation in quota system, age, education period. A high correlation was observed between pre-internship score and total scores mean, physiopathology, basic sciences and clinical scores, respectively (0.79, 0.75, 0.73 and 0.73).Conclusion: Age, quota system, education period, the clinical score mean, infectious diseases, pharmacology and psychiatry scores are the most important factors influencing the exams results, due to high and significant relative risks. Marital status, quota system, age and education period cause the students taking part in a preinternship exam to get different means.

Background: Oral cancer is the 51hprevalent cancer and one of the main reason for mortality all over the world. It is a serious risk for health. The high mortality may be happened because of dentists' inexact examination or the lack of enough information.Objective: The aim of the present study was to assess the knowledge and diagnostic skill of a group of Iranian dentists in oral cancer prevention and early detection.Methods: The Pretested questionnaires were distributed among 412 general dental practitioners who voluntarily participated, in the 40th international congress of Iranian Dental Association (IDA) in 2000.Results: Most of the respondents were male (60.2%) and aged lower than 37 years old (63.3%).Respondents totally replied 55% of knowledge (x- =5.59) and 55% of diagnostic skills (x- =1.65) questions correctly. A significant correlation was found between the knowledge and diagnostic skills scores (r=0.4, P<0.05). The correct response percent was significantly higher among the young dentists rather than other ages, in both knowledge & diagnostic skills domain (P<0.05).Conclusion: The present study indicated a need for further training and continuing education programs for dentists in oral cancer field.

Background: Continuing Nursing Education (CNE) is considered as proper reply to the rapid changes in health care delivery and promoting professional standards of current practice among the nurses. It is an active process that can take place through a variety of activities such as reading the professional journals or textbooks, listening to the lectures, or observing other nurses practicing.Objectives: This study was conducted to investigate the nurses' opinion about continuing nursing education, and to determine the educational resources as well as nurses' educational needs.Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted in the teaching hospitals in Kermanshah. For data collection, a questionnaire based on five item likert scale was distributed among one hundred nurses who participated in this study.Results: 37% of the participants were male and 63% were female and their mean age was 34.15 years old. They experienced nursing for more than ten years (10.97).36% of them were single and 64% were married. "To improve patient care" was considered as the most important factor to take part in continuing education programs (x- =3.89). "Obstacles to participation" indicated similar importance with a low difference (the lowest mean=3.19 and the highest mean=3.39). "Disease process" was mentioned as the most important field requiring continuing education (x- =3.1).Conclusion: Continuing education should play an important role in nursing. To increase nurses' motivation and decrease the obstacles, we recommend increasing the personnel number, decreasing workload, considering workshop participation as factors of job improvement and allocating special times to education.

Background: Teachers' performance evaluation is one of the most important tools in the education process. It is used to determine weaknesses and strengths of education so that by reinforcing the strong points we can improve the education quality.Objective: To determine the validity and reliability of practical and theoretical teaching evaluation questionnaires regarding the faculty by the students in Kerman University of Medical Sciences.Methods: The validity and reliability of the existing EDC questionnaires were reevaluated. At first, the content validity and weight of each item were calculated using the faculty members' views, then the internal consistency of the questionnaires was determined by alpha chronbach.Results: Theoretical and practical teaching methods categories including six and seven items showed the highest validity (0.95 and 0.97 respectively). The evaluation category in questionnaire on the theoretical courses indicated the lowest validity (0.69). The questionnaires having 0.91 and 0.97 reliability were considered proper for teacher evaluation according to the students.Conclusion: The results of this research showed that only one item should be omitted because of the absence of the suitable content validity. However to final confirmation of validity and reliability, it is better to use construct validity and test re-test methods, respectively.