Iranian Journal of Medical Education
Year:2002 | Volume:1 | Issue:4 (4)|Papers Count:10

Introduction. Evaluation is one of the important aspects of educational activities. Through Evaluation, we can point out the weaknesses and strengths of educational programs and also we will be able to present an effective solution for solving the problems of educational programs. The purpose of this survey was to study the methodology of student assessment performed by faculty members.Methods. A questionnaire was designed and distributed between the faculty members. The earned data from 51 returned questionnaires was analyzed by SPSS software. Descriptive and analytic statistics were used for analyzing the data.Results. According to the results, 72.5% of the faculty members teaching basic medical sciences used formative evaluation and 27.5% of them used summative evaluation. The most important tests used for student assessment were multiple choice questions and written tests, respectively. The faculty members mainly considered the final exam as their most important criterion. The majority of them (90.2%) used lesson plan during their teaching. About 30% of them carried Ph.D. degree and most of them taught in more than one level. 51% of them performed mid-term exam. There was a significant relationship between the taught educational level and evaluation method.Conclusion. Although the faculty members mainly used formative evaluation, they considered final exam as the most important evaluation criterion. Most of the faculty members were young with little experience. The mean of the number of units they taught in each semester was more than their required number. Reviewing evaluation and teaching methods and considering new methods of evaluation can decrease the present problems in educational programs.

Introduction. One way to measure the impact of educational programs is the evaluation of graduates performance in their workplace. The present study was conducted to evaluate B.S. nursing graduates performance from the perspectives of their own and their head nurses in hospitals affiliated to Isfahan University of Medical Sciences in 2001.Methods. This research was based on triangulation study and was carried out in two phases using two methods: In the first phase, in order to gather necessary data to design the questionnaire, Delphi method was used; and in the second one, in order to carry out the very evaluation, Survey method with Parallel design was utilized. Sampling method was based on census and the study population consisted of two groups: 97 B.S. nursing graduates and 49 head nurses. A questionnaire composed of 6 performance dimensions was used to collect the data. The validity of the questionnaire was confirmed by content validity and the reliability was determined by Alpha-Cronbach.Results. Study findings were as follows: average performance evaluation score given by graduates was significantly higher than their head nurses, except for the education and research dimensions. Further, concerning the levels of good and excellent, the highest and lowest frequencies were respectively attributed to the nursing care (91.7%) and the education and research (42.3%) dimensions by graduates and to the professional development (67.3%) and the education and research (30.6%) dimensions by head nurses.Conclusion. Nursing graduates low performance in educational and research areas can be improved by proper programming and cooperation between educational groups. Also, presenting continuing education concerning research and nurses educational activities can fortify these performances.

Introduction. Hepatitis B is the most common cause of end stage liver disease in Iran. As a high-cost disease with a relatively high incidence, and the relative lack of community knowledge, it warrants initiation of a public health intervention in Iran.Methods. This was a Before-After educational intervention that analyzed the data obtained from questionnaires filled out by 80 patients infected by Hepatitis B and their family members. The patients were registered and invited by “Hamedan Society for Support of Hepatic Patients” for the educational program. The questionnaire was designed in order to evaluate the degree of knowledge according to patients' needs and experts' ideas; i.e. means of transmission, preventive measures and their use and some basic practical knowledge of hepatitis B management. Nedelsky method and T-paired test were used to analyze the results.Results. The participants were aged between 11 and 59 (The age of the participants was from 11 to 59) and about half of them were females. The comparison between pre-test and post-test indicated a significant increase in the learners' level of knowledge concerning transmission of and prevention from hepatitis B and its management. 45% of the participants got an acceptable score in pre-test while in post-test it increased to 69% of them. 90% of the participants believed that the performed education had been effective in increasing their knowledge about hepatitis. 81% found the question-answer session effective in solving their problems. Moreover, 92.5% described the instructors teaching method good or very good. Finally, 36% believed that they still had some questions about hepatitis B. Interestingly, both before and after education, about 90% thought they needed more education regarding hepatitis B.Conclusion. Group education is a useful tool for improving patients' and their families' knowledge of and attitude towards hepatitis B in an example of Iranian community situation.

Introduction. This survey was performed to assess the competency level of last year medical students (Interns) in performing 20 selected basic clinical procedures as well as the effect of learning opportunities on their competency level.Methods. 200 randomly selected interns were asked to fill a questionnaire in order to self-assess their competency in performing 20 procedures and to record the ones they used in practice. These procedures were selected from current educational programs, according to expert opinion. They were also asked about the related learning opportunities they faced in clinical wards. The 20 selected procedures were divided into three groups by employing factor analysis with Varimax rotation (KMO=0.87).Results. The mean level of skills for the first group (general techniques) was 51.4%. Students assessed their level of skills "poor" for lumbar puncturing, airway intubation, splinting, chest tube insertion, and removal of superficial foreign bodies from the ear and the eye. They learnt most of the techniques through observation. Most of the students performed the procedures without direct supervision of teachers or residents. The majority of the students did not have the opportunity to use manikins for learning.Conclusion. The results suggested that competence of the students in performing most of the procedures was insufficient and most of them did the procedures without the needed training. It is recommended that using some educational facilities including skill labs and student assessment methods including OSCE (Objective Structured Clinical Evaluation) can play an important role in improving students' level of skills in performing clinical procedures, especially before working as interns at clinical wards and in order to respect patients' rights.

Introduction. One of the basic human activities is learning and education. Indeed the role of education is to facilitate learning but many internal or external factors affect the learning process such as learners' physical, affective and mental readiness. If we don't pay attention to these factors, they will lead to a superficial learning and finally the trained and graduated students wont be efficient enough. If we determine the factors affecting students' readiness for learning, we will be able to adopt a proper strategy for teaching. Therefore this research was planned to determine the level of learners' readiness for learning according to B.S. students and also to determine its correlation with some of their demographic characteristics.Methods. This research was a cross-sectional survey. The research samples consisted of 298 B.S. students from four schools including: Health, Nursing and Midwifery, Management & Informatics and Rehabilitation, selected based on simple stratified sampling. The tool for collecting data was a questionnaire whose validity and reliability were determined by content validity and test re-test respectively. Descriptive analytic statistics was used for data analysis.Results. The mean score of physical, affective and mental readiness for learning in four schools were calculated. Although a significant difference was observed for some factors related to learners readiness between the schools, but ANOVA didn't show a significant difference between the mean score of physical readiness, affective readiness and mental readiness in four schools. Also, other tests including Mann-Whitney, students t test, ANOVA and Pearson correlation coefficient showed a significant relationship between participants' characteristics and their readiness for learning.Conclusion. Students' physical readiness is more affected by life conditions while affective and mental readiness has to be under special consideration by people in charge of medical education. Holding talking sessions with students, supervising educational programs and improving faculty members performance can facilitate students learning.

Introduction. Presenting an appropriate model for university accreditation is a great task for supervising and assessment system of higher education institutions. The present survey was conducted to design an appropriate model for the accreditation of medical universities in Iran. The objectives of this study were: to determine the components and performance indicators in medical universities, to design and propose a model for the accreditation of medical universities in Iran and, to determine the amount of national credibility for the proposed model.Methods. A descriptive survey was carried out in two stages. In the first stage, a questionnaire was used to determine the components and performance indicators. The questionnaire consisted of 16 main components and 216 performance indicators which were ranked from 0 to 7 based on their desirability. The second stage included designing a model by reviewing the literature and considering the special situation of the country. Then a questionnaire using Likert scale and two written questions was used in order to determine its national credibility. The findings were analyzed by descriptive statistics and factor analysis method.Results. Some of the components and performance indicators like publishing books and the existence of information systems were more important and had the priority compared to the rest of the factors. Findings of the second stage showed that the proposed model according to the view points of 30 experts in the field of medical education got a high approval (70.27% in high level). Conclusion. Despite many attempts regarding accreditation in higher education in Iran, these institutions suffer from a number of shortcomings in terms of quality. This model is semi-centralized and consists of four steps; request for accreditation, determining the components and performance indicators, self - assessment process, and peer evaluation. This model can be implemented for the quality assessment or university accreditation in Iran.

Introduction. The attitude of medical students towards their own discipline will have an effective role in major plannings of the government concerning the field of medicine. This study aims to assess students' attitude towards studying medicine, and to determine the relationship between students' attitude and their demographic characteristics.Methods. A cross–sectional descriptive study was done in April 1999. A checklist containing 30 phrases for assessing attitude was distributed among medical students in different years of study. 380 completed questionnaires were collected, then the mean of attitude was calculated based on the grade of attitude for each question using Likert scale. The statistical methods including one way ANOVA and Pearson correlation coefficient were used to compare the correlation between the grade of attitude and demographic characteristics.Results. The mean of students' test grade was 73.78 which was less than the mean of total test grade. There was a significant relationship between students' attitude and their gender, so that the females had a higher degree of attitude than males. Also, the attitude grade decreased with increment of age and years of study. In comparing the students attitude and their marital status and being local or not, no significant relationship was found.Conclusion. It is concluded that about 90% of the students had a mean degree of attitude less than total test grade, suggesting that most of them had a negative attitude towards education. Female students had a more positive attitude comparing to males.

Introduction. The significance of fostering critical thinking in students has been explicated by the increasing rate of knowledge and information. To assimilate knowledge and to assess the considerable amount of information, students need to develop their thinking skills. Considering reflection as a teaching strategy and one of the most effective ways for fostering thinking, this study was designed to determine the effect of reflection on thinking skills of nursing students at Tabriz faculty of nursing and midwifery.Methods. 40 senior nursing students participated in this study voluntarily. After receiving the necessary information regarding their participation they took California Critical Thinking Skill Test. Then they were divided into 2 equal case and control groups. Both groups had their routine clinical programs, but the interventional program was offered only to the case group. This interventional program consisted of 3 main parts: A 4 day workshop on reflection and 10 weeks reflection on their clinical experiences, concluding dialog journals and writing up logs. At the end of their clinical program, both groups took the same test as pretest. Data were analyzed by paired T-test and T-test.Results: Results of the study revealed that reflection has been effective on improving inductive reasoning and total scores of critical thinking skills of students.Conclusion: Improving general critical thinking skills due to a disciplinary specific strategy was a valuable outcome. Regarding this results, reflection is recommended to be infused in our educational program.