Teaching Aids in Pharmacology Teaching and Learning Methodology: A Study from a Medical College of Nepal.

The main objective of the study was to find out students liking regarding the various audio visual aids which can improve the lectures in Pharmacology in future in Nepal.This was a cross sectional questionnaire based study was carried out at Manipal College of Medical Sciences, Pokhara, Nepal between January - July 2013. Chi square test were used for analytical purpose. We calculated odds ratios and their 95% confidence intervals (95% CI).P-value < 0.05 was considered to be statistically significant. Questionnaire validation tests showed that the Alpha Cronbach was 0.68. Two eighty two preclinical medical students participated in the study. Two seventy two students completed the questionnaire completely and their responses were evaluated which gives an overall response rate of 96.45%. 52.6% of the students were males and rest were females. Based on the Nationality 41.2% were Indians followed by Nepali 30.1%, Srilankan 25.7% and Maldivian were 2.9%. According to the students the best teaching aids were combination of teaching aids was opted by 61% of the students followed by power point presentation 31.6%, black board 5.9% and dictating notes 1.5%. Most of the students preferred handouts after lectures 56.6% and 43.4% preferred taking notes during lecture classes. Female student preferred taking lecture notes whereas male students preferred taking handouts after the lecture class. It was found that male student has a [OR 4.834, 95% (CI 2.882, 8.109)] more tendency of taking hand outs after the lecture class as compared to taking down notes during lectures. This finding was statistically significant (P<0.05). It is concluded from the study that a combination of different Audio visual aids, viz. blackboard presentation and power point presentation together can improve the lectures and will facilitate the medical student to understand Pharmacology in a better way.