title: Enhancing primary care clerkships with virtual patients.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Virtual patients, computer-assisted patient scenarios, have been used in different medical disciplines over several years. Researchers have already gained knowledge on how it helps foster clinical thinking, fills knowledge gaps and enables patient management. Nonetheless, despite these advances in knowledge, the use of virtual patients in Family Medicine education remains limited.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  We point out the current knowledge, benefits and potential ways of using virtual patients in the Family Medicine setting.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Virtual patients can be used as a preparation tool for clinical clerkships as well as learning about patient treatment not usually encountered in every day practice. Regardless of the means of implementation, students benefit from acquiring skills through multifaceted virtual patients. We firmly believe that, when intelligently applied, virtual patients can enhance and improve future Family Medicine education.
authors.affiliation: a Faculty of Medicine, Department of Family Medicine , University of Maribor , Maribor , Slovenia.
authors.forename: Monika
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sobocan
authors.affiliation: a Faculty of Medicine, Department of Family Medicine , University of Maribor , Maribor , Slovenia.
authors.forename: Zalika
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Klemenc-Ketis
mesh_terms: D002982:Clinical Clerkship / Q000379:methods*; D003194:Computer-Assisted Instruction; D004504:Education, Medical, Undergraduate / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D016544:Patient Simulation; D011320:Primary Health Care
keywords: Virtual patients; clinical clerkship; distance education; medical education; undergraduate