(1723.pdf) IMPACT OF VIRTUAL PATIENT CASES ON WRITTEN EXAMINATION PERFORMANCE

摘要

Background:Safe and effective approaches to facilitate the development of clinically relevant knowledge andskills are necessary in health professional education. One means of developing clinical reasoningskills is through the use of virtual patients cases (VPs). There is little work documenting the studyof when and how to effectively use VPs. Hypothesis: students using virtual patient cases toprepare for written examinations will do better than those without access.Methods:A randomized controlled trial of Physiotherapy students. All participants took a Multiple-ChoiceQuestion (MCQ) exam, testing their knowledge in four domains of practice. They were thencomputer randomised into immediate access (group A) or delayed access (group B) for 12 days ofVP access. After Group A accessed the VPs, a second MCQ exam was made available to allstudents. Two weeks after the VPs were made available to group B, all students completed aquestionnaire about their perceptions of learning from the VPs.Results:Of the 78 available students 67 (86%) volunteered to participate, and 65 (83%) took the first examwith 32 randomised to immediate VP access. Of these, 5 students did not complete the secondexam, 4 from group A. The mean score (SD) for the first exam for group A and B is, 67(±7) and66(±7) respectively. The mean score (SD) for the second exam for group A and B respectively is,66(±4) and 67(±6): no statistically significantly different change p = 0.37. Mean difference betweengroups = -1.2 (95% CI -3.98 to 1.49). Omitting those who got >65% in the first exam, the medianchange in score (SD) between the first and second exams of groups A and B are, 7(±6) and 3(±7)respectively.Conclusions:Students may benefit from the use of virtual patients for revision.