gms | German Medical Science

Background: At the Faculty of Medicine, University of Maribor, 3^rd-year medical students are taught clinical examination on each other under the supervision of peer tutors in the scope of the subject Internal medicine. In order to upgrade traditional peer teaching, we recorded two clinical examinations (abdominal and pulmonary system examination) performed by peer tutors to enable students’ easier revision. The aim of our study was to evaluate the effect of the videos on the student performance at the objective structured clinical examination (OSCE).

Methods: The study was carried out at the Clinical Skills Laboratory at our facility in November 2016. For each clinical examination, students were divided in two groups: the experimental group (students who watched the video) and the control group (students who did not watch the video). Both groups participated in the peer tutor supervised educational process for 1 month before acceding to OSCE. The videos were accessible on the Youtube platform five days prior to and mid OSCE, so students were able to watch it multiple times.

At OSCE, the students were evaluated by peer tutors. Statistical analysis was performed using Mann-Whitney U-test. Statistical significance was set at p<0.05.

Results: The video of pulmonary system examination was viewed by 51 students (60.7%) and the video of the abdominal examination by 54 (64.3%) out of 84 students that were included in the study. In the pulmonary system examination OSCE, the mean score of the control group was 46.4±3.5 (range 37-50) out of 50 points with the average time 739.5±48.3 seconds (s) (range 600-780 s) out of 780 s. In the experimental group, students gained on average 47.0±2.9 points (range 40-50) and completed the examination in 740.8±55.2 s (range 480-780 s).

In the abdominal examination OSCE, the mean score of the control group was 37.9±2.0 (range 33-40) out of 40 points with the average time 460.5±24.5 s (range 391-480 s) out of 480 s; and 37.4±3.2 points (range 23.5-40) with the average time 461.4±25.4 s (range 360-480 s) for experimental group, respectively (see figure 1 [Fig. 1]).

Mann-Whitney test for independent samples showed no statistically significant difference between the groups in score (p=0.385) and time (p=0.798) in the pulmonary system examination, as well as in abdominal examination (p=0.800 and p=0.871, respectively).

Discussion: Previous studies from our faculty proved the positive effect of video supported learning of clinical skills, such as venipuncture and setting up an infusion [1]. According to our results, there was no significant difference between the performance of control and experimental groups in the selected clinical examinations. The small difference between the groups may be due to the fact that students already prepared thoroughly with conventional learning methods, which is shown by the average score of more than 90% in the control group.

There might be a significant difference between the groups if one would learn without conventional peer teaching, but this is beyond the focus of this study.

Nevertheless, we believe that addition of video-enhanced learning to classical peer teaching as a revising tool may improve students’ confidence. It offers them a foundation for basic examination technique revising. Contrary to peer teaching, video could be accessible throughout the year.