Journal of Advances in Medical Education & Professionalism

Students teaching students: A novel solution for teaching procedures via instruction on the corpse

Authors

CARLOS E GARCIA RODRIGUEZ 1
RAJ J SHAH 1
CODY SMITH 1
CHRISTOPHER J GAY 2
JARED ALVARADO 1
DOUGLAS RAPPAPORT 3
WILLIAM RT J ADAMAS-RAPPAPORT 4
RICHARD AMINI 5

1 College of Medicine, University of Arizona, 1501 N Campbell Ave, Tucson, AZ 85724, USA

2 University of Arizona College of Medicine - Tucson

3 Department of Emergency Medicine,Mayo Clinic Hospital, Phoenix, AZ, USA

4 Department of Surgery, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA

5 Department of Emergency Medicine, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA

https://doi.org/10.30476/jamp.2019.44708
Abstract
Introduction: Increased faculty and resident responsibilities have ledto the decreased time available for teaching clinical skills to medicalstudents. Numerous advances in education and simulation haveattempted to obviate this problem; however, documented success islacking. Our objective was to describe a novel fresh cadaver-based,student-driven procedural skills lab and to compare the educationaleffectiveness of student instructors to the senior instructor (SI).
Methods: This was a prospective study performed at an academic medical center. A pilot program, “Students Teaching Students,” was introduced where four trained first-year medical students (TMS)
instructed 41 other untrained first-year medical students in technical procedures. This study compared the teaching evaluations of the SI with the TMS teaching equivalent procedures. Paired t-test was used to determine statistically significant changes in procedural confidence between pre- and post-training. Utilizing a post-training questionnaire, average post-training confidence improvement values and objective post-training test scores of the participants were compared between TMS and SI, using a 2 sample t-test. Statistical significance was considered as a pResults: Twenty-nine out of 39 (74%) students completed the questionnaire. Both groups demonstrated a statistically significant improvement in subjective confidence level in performing each procedure when pre- and post-training scores were compared, while there was no statistically significant difference found in cognitive knowledge between the groups (p=0.73). There was no statistically significant difference in the mean confidence improvement between the SI and TMS groups for chest tube insertion (2.06 versus 1.92 respectively, p=0.587), femoral line placement (2.00 versus 1.94 respectively, p=0.734) or student test score (88% versus 85% respectively).
Conclusion: Our results demonstrate that first-year medical students well-trained in technical skills, such as our TMS, may be a valuable additional teaching resource. The Students Teaching Students
procedure lab employed in this study was effective at immediately increasing first-year medical students’ confidence and technical skill. First-year medical students well-trained in technical skills, such as our TMS, may be a valuable additional teaching resource.

Keywords

Emergency Medicine. Procedure. Education. Technical Skills. Airway
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Journal of Advances in Medical Education & Professionalism
Volume 7, Issue 2 - Serial Number 2
33
Spring 2019
Pages 51-55

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