title: A problem-based learning tutorial for dental students regarding elderly residents in a nursing home in Japan.
abstract: This educational trial was an eight-day problem-based learning (PBL) course for fourth-year predoctoral students at Okayama University's dental school who interviewed elderly residents living in a nursing home. The purpose of this PBL course was to introduce geriatric dentistry to the students by allowing them, independently, to discover the clinical problems of elderly patients as well as the solutions. The sixty-five students were divided into nine small groups and received patient information (age, gender, degree of care needed, medical history, food type, medications, and oral condition) in datasheets before visiting the nursing home. Each group of students directly interviewed one patient and the caregivers and identified the patient's medical, psychological, and social problems. After the interview, the students participated in a PBL tutorial to delineate a management approach for the patient's problems. To measure the efficacy of this program, the students completed a questionnaire before and after the course regarding their level of understanding of and attitudes toward geriatric dentistry, clinical research, and self-study. The results showed that student's perceptions of their knowledge about and attitudes toward oral health care for the elderly significantly increased after the PBL course, which suggests that such tutorials should be an option for dental curricula.
authors.affiliation: Okayama University Graduate School of Medicine, Dentistry, and Pharmaceutical Sciences, 2-5-1 Shikatacho, Kita-ku, Okayama, 700-8525, Japan. kuboki@md.okayama-u.ac.jp
authors.forename: Yoshizo
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Matsuka
authors.forename: Ryu
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Nakajima
authors.forename: Haruna
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Miki
authors.forename: Aya
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kimura
authors.forename: Manabu
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kanyama
authors.forename: Hajime
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Minakuchi
authors.forename: Shigehiko
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Shinkawa
authors.forename: Hiroya
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Takiuchi
authors.forename: Kumiko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Nawachi
authors.forename: Kenji
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Maekawa
authors.forename: Hikaru
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Arakawa
authors.forename: Takuo
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Fujisawa
authors.forename: Wataru
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Sonoyama
authors.forename: Atsushi
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mine
authors.forename: Emilio Satoshi
authors.initials: ES
authors.lastname: Hara
authors.forename: Takeshi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kikutani
authors.forename: Takuo
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kuboki
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002983:Clinical Competence; D003149:Community Dentistry / Q000193:education; D016321:Dental Care for Aged; D004497:Education, Dental / Q000379:methods; D005260:Female; D015577:Geriatric Assessment / Q000379:methods*; D005850:Geriatric Dentistry / Q000193:education*; D006801:Humans; D007297:Inpatients; D007564:Japan; D008297:Male; D020380:Needs Assessment; D009735:Nursing Homes; D010347:Patient Care Planning; D019239:Practice Patterns, Dentists'; D018794:Problem-Based Learning; D015397:Program Evaluation