ABSTRACT
Objective To assess the effect of psychological group on improving the learning attitude of interns in the pediatric clinical practice.Methods This study included 67 medical students who enrolled during 2012 to 2013 and had done the clinical pediatrics in the Second Affiliated Hospital of Shantou University Medical College.The students carried out pediatric clinical practice as requested.Based on the practice of pediatric practice,the psychological group counseling was conducted by voluntary participation.Each psychological group consisted of 5 or 6 students and performed once a week.Each time of psychological group lasted for 1.5 hours and 6 times in total.The students were divided into intervention group and non-intervention group according to whether they participated in psychological group.Each student filled in the Pediatric Clinical Internship Attitude Assessment Form and the College Student Personality Questionnaire at the first week and the last week of pediatric clinical practice.SPSS 17.0 was applied to conduct Chi square test and t test.Results There were 33 students in the intervention group and 40 students in the non-intervention group.The effective rate of questionnaires for intervention group and non-intervention group were 100％ and 85％,respectively.The mental state of pediatric interns between two groups was not different before and after the pediatric clinical practice (P＞0.05).Before pediatric clinical practice,the learning attitude score between two groups was not different [(83.82 ± 8.39) vs.(84.39 ± 8.29),t=-0.28,P=0.781].After pediatric clinical practice,the learning attitude score of pediatric interns who used psychological group teaching model was better than that of pediatric interns who used traditional teaching model [(88.91 ± 7.40) vs.(75.03 ± 11.19),t=-5.969,P=0.000].Conclusion Psychological group can help medical students to develop empathy toward sick children and their parents,and then improve their learning attitude in pediatric practice.The results of this study can provide a preliminary basis for the popularization of psychological group in the whole process of medical internship.