gms | German Medical Science

Introduction: According to the the German medical licensure laws logbooks are mandatory for the practical year. In Frankfurt a logbook suggested by the "Deutsche Dermatologische Gesellschaft" was used since March 2013.

Objective: What is the experience with this logbook after more than 3 years of usage?

Material & methods: Every student in the practical year received a written instruction on the use of the logbook. at the beginning of the rotation. Logbooks had a DIN A 5 format in order to be always at hand. The logbooks of all students at the dermatology clinic at the university hospital Frankfurt were evaluated (3/2013 – 3/2016; n= 28: m=7, f=21).

Results: 12 students signed the logbook completely by themselves. 16 had all items signed by someone else. Only 9 had items signed by senior physicians. Especially the following items were missing: mycology (n=12); Woodlight examination (n=10), phlebology (n=8), proctology (n=7), histology (n=6), trichogram (n=6). No plans for the therapy of the following diseases were made: verrucae n=6, rosazea n=4, impetigo n=3.. Every student should have direct observations of n=3 whole body examinations/pre-procedure patient interviews as well as 1 history taking. Documented were 72/84 whole body examinations, 71/84 pre-procedure patient interviews and 24/28 histories. Only 37 evaluations and 12 proposals for improvement were made for the whole body examination, 23 and 9 for the pre-procedure patient interviews and 0 and 8 for history taking. The possibility for documentation were used by n=19 (1–46 pages, mean 13 pages).