title: Early experience of a virtual journal club.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Traditional journal club models based on didactic presentation sessions followed by group discussion have many limitations. To overcome some of these shortcomings, a virtual journal club (VJC) using social media and e-mail was developed. The aim of this study was to report the initial experience of this novel multimodal e-learning platform to facilitate journal club discussion and promote the development of critical appraisal skills.
  
  
  METHODS
  Journal articles were discussed monthly via e-mail and social media. After a 3-week period of discussion, all comments were collated and group-generated critical appraisal summaries were fed back to participants. In addition, letters to the journal editors based on the group appraisal were submitted. A questionnaire survey to evaluate the VJC concept was also conducted.
  
  
  RESULTS
  After eight cycles of the VJC, the mean trainee participation rate was 29.6 per cent (range 21.1-42.1%). Senior trainees (≥4 years of postgraduate experience) were more likely to participate than more junior trainees (75.0 versus 21.1%; p = 0.005). The majority of participants thought that the VJC was educationally valuable, easy to participate in, helpful in keeping up to date with recent papers and useful in developing critical appraisal skills. Barriers to participation were lack of time, motivation and lack of experience in critical appraisal. In addition, the group-generated critical appraisal summaries derived from VJC discussions led to eight published 'letters to the editor'. Traditional journal club models based on didactic presentation sessions followed by group discussion have many limitations
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This novel VJC model is a feasible and popular method of delivering a journal club in the postgraduate setting.
authors.affiliation: Department of General Surgery, Royal Alexandra Hospital, Paisley, UK.
authors.forename: Raymond
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Oliphant
authors.affiliation: Department of General Surgery, Royal Alexandra Hospital, Paisley, UK.
authors.forename: Vivienne
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Blackhall
authors.affiliation: Department of General Surgery, Royal Alexandra Hospital, Paisley, UK.
authors.forename: Susan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Moug
authors.affiliation: Department of General Surgery, Royal Alexandra Hospital, Paisley, UK.
authors.forename: Patrick
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Finn
authors.affiliation: Department of General Surgery, Royal Alexandra Hospital, Paisley, UK.
authors.forename: Mark
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Vella
authors.affiliation: Department of General Surgery, Royal Alexandra Hospital, Paisley, UK.
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Renwick
mesh_terms: D004502:Education, Medical, Continuing / Q000379:methods*; D034742:Electronic Mail; D013502:General Surgery / Q000193:education; D006801:Humans; D010506:Periodicals as Topic; D061108:Social Media; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires