Facilitation of problem finding among first year medical school students undergoing problem-based learning.
BACKGROUND
Adaptation to problem-based learning (PBL) is a difficult process for high school graduates who are not used to self-directed learning, especially in the freshmen year of medical school. The difficulty includes finding problems from a given case.


OBJECTIVE
Evaluate the effect of an intervention to facilitate case-based problem finding among medical school freshmen undergoing a PBL tutorial.


METHODS
Medical school freshmen in 2000 (nonintervened group) and 2001 (intervened group) participated in the study. The intervened group received the modified problem-based program by (a) having briefings on the importance of problem finding, (b) encouragement by the tutors in problem finding, and (c) reinforcement using a self-assessment sheet. At the end of the year, the ability of students to extract problems from a short case was evaluated and compared with the nonintervened students.


RESULTS
The intervened group extracted a significantly greater number of problems than the nonintervened group. When extracted problems were categorized, the intervened group was able to generate more questions in a greater number of specified categories.


CONCLUSIONS
Interventions to foster problem finding significantly facilitated acquisition of problem extraction skills among young medical students.
Yoshioka
Toshimasa
T
Tokyo Women's Medical University School of Medicine, Department of Medical Education, Tokyo 162-8666, Japan. yoshioka@research.twmu.ac.jp
Suganuma
Taiyo
T
Tang
Ann C
AC
Matsushita
Susumu
S
Manno
Sumie
S
Kozu
Tadahiko
T
D004504:Education, Medical, Undergraduate; D004521:Educational Measurement; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007564:Japan; D018794:Problem-Based Learning; D013337:Students, Medical