Effective Learning, Leadership and Professionalism Series (ELLPS) nurturing early clinical year development: Transformation based on medical students’ feedbacks.
Abstract Objective To develop an improved early clinical year development programme based on undergraduate medical students’ feedback on the existing programme. Design A one-day evaluation workshop on existing early clinical year development programme was conducted in September 2018 based on a semi-structured qualitative feedback comprising four domains which were the 1) organisation 2) overall programme content 3) comments on each topic content and 4) suggestions on the improvement for future programmes. The domain on comments and suggestions examine the attitudes on 1) what should be learnt 2) when learning should occur 3) what methods should be used 4) how learning should be assessed and 5) what kind of students’ barriers are in such development programme throughout their early clinical years. Participants A total of 220 first-year undergraduate medical students in Year 1 MBBS programme attended the workshop. Results A total of 211 (95.9%) medical students have participated in the feedback survey. Majority of students (more than 80%) were satisfied with the overall programme. Fifty students (23.7%) have provided their comments and suggestions for future improvement. Three domains emerged: 1) effective learning 2) leadership and 3) professionalism encompass eight inter-related themes: 1) packed sessions 2) interactive session 3) learning style 4) critical thinking 5) student-centred learning 6) innovative learning 7) mental fitness and 8) sharing session. Conclusions An improved early clinical year development programme is proposed based on the first-year undergraduate medical students’ feedbacks. It is a transformation to a student-based curriculum with the integration of advanced use of information technology and management education. These findings offer insights into the students’ view of future doctors’ development in effective learning, leadership and professionalism in the clinical context.