ABSTRACT
Near-peer teaching is an educational format which utilizes tutors who are more advanced in a curriculum's content to supervise students' activities and to act as instructors in laboratory settings. This format is often used in anatomy laboratory courses. The goal of the present study is to describe the design and implementation of near-peer teaching in an anatomy course and to evaluate students' perceptions of the program. A total of 700 students were registered for this anatomy course which employed near-peer instructors. Of enrolled students, 558 (79.7%) agreed to participate in this study. In general, the practical section (e.g., the clinical hour, image-based anatomy session, and gross anatomy laboratory) of the course was viewed more favorably compared to the theory section (54.8%, n = 306), with dissection and prosection in the laboratory rated as the most valued experiences (34.9%, n = 195). Near-peer teaching is a viable option that satisfies the demands of modern curricula using small groups. This format stimulates learning within courses that have large numbers of students and low faculty-to-student ratios.
Subject(s)
Anatomy/education , Education, Medical, Undergraduate/methods , Faculty, Medical , Peer Group , Students , Teaching/methods , Adolescent , Comprehension , Curriculum , Dissection/education , Educational Measurement , Faculty, Medical/statistics & numerical data , Female , Humans , Learning , Male , Mexico , Perception , Program Development , Program Evaluation , Schools, Medical , Students/psychology , Students/statistics & numerical data , Surveys and Questionnaires , Universities , Young AdultSubject(s)
Adolescent , Child , Female , Humans , Male , Emergency Service, Hospital/statistics & numerical data , Hospitals, University/statistics & numerical data , Wounds, Gunshot/epidemiology , Crime/statistics & numerical data , Mexico/epidemiology , Pediatrics , Retrospective Studies , Substance-Related Disorders/epidemiologyABSTRACT
Traditional medical school curricula have made a clear demarcation between the basic biomedical sciences and the clinical years. It is our view that a comprehensive medical education necessarily involves an increased correlation between basic science knowledge and its clinical applications. A basic anatomy course should have two main objectives: for the student to successfully gain a solid knowledge base of human anatomy and to develop and hone clinical reasoning skills. In a basic anatomy course, clinical case discussions based on underlying anatomic anomalies or abnormalities are the major means to teach students clinical reasoning skills. By identifying, classifying, and analyzing the clinical data given, a student learns to methodically approach a clinical case and formulate plausible diagnoses. Practicing and perfecting clinical problem-solving skills should be a major objective of the anatomy curriculum. Such clinical reasoning skills are indeed crucial for the successful and expert practice of medicine.
