Eight years’ experience with a Medical Education Journal Club in Mexico: a quasi-experimental one-group study

Abstract

BackgroundA time-honored strategy for keeping up to date in medicine and improving critical appraisal skills is the Journal Club (JC). There are several reports of its use in medicine and allied health sciences but almost no reports of JC focused on medical education. The purpose of the study is to describe and evaluate an eight years’ experience with a medical education Journal Club (MEJC).MethodsWe started a monthly medical education JC in 2006 at UNAM Faculty of Medicine in Mexico City. Its goal is to provide faculty with continuing professional development in medical education. A discussion guide and a published paper were sent 2 weeks before sessions. We reviewed the themes and publication types of the papers used in the sessions, and in June-July 2014 administered a retrospective post-then-pre evaluation questionnaire to current participants that had been regular attendees to the JC for more than 2 years. The retrospective post-then-pre comparisons were analyzed with Wilcoxon signed-rank test. Effect sizes were calculated for the pre-post comparisons with Cohen’s r.ResultsThere have been 94 MEJC sessions until July 2014. Average attendance is 20 persons, a mix of clinicians, educators, psychologists and a sociologist. The articles were published in 32 different journals, and covered several medical education themes (curriculum, faculty development, educational research methodology, learning methods, assessment, residency education). 22 Attendees answered the evaluation instrument. The MEJC had a positive evaluation from good to excellent, and there was an improvement in self-reported competencies in medical education literature critical appraisal and behaviors related to the use of evidence in educational practice, with a median effect size higher than 0.5. The evaluation instrument had a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.96.ConclusionsA periodic Medical Education Journal Club can improve critical appraisal of the literature, and be maintained long-term using evidence-based strategies. This activity is a useful adjunct to the scholarship of teaching.

The reach of Spanish-language YouTube videos on physical examinations made by undergraduate medical students

“…The most populated Spanish-speaking country, Mexico, also showed the most views; it also ranked highly in views relative to the population, which is consistent with other studies reporting an intense interest in medical education content in Mexico [ 9 ]. More men watched the videos than women in our study, in contrast with the demographic make-up of the medical student body in Spain and Latin America, where women tend to outnumber men [ 9 ].…”

Promoting the Conduct of Medical Education Journal Clubs in Teaching Medical Institutions

“…As such sessions are not limited to one specific department, it will be a welcome move to invite different stakeholders (such as faculty members, medical education unit members, postgraduate students from other departments, and others). 46,51 It is always nice to ensure that different participants take lead for the conduct of the medical education journal club sessions, preferably in rotation, so that everyone remains involved in the process. 1,46,47 As the number of such sessions conducted over a year is not many, it is quite essential that the article selected for the journal club session is novel, adds knowledge, and appeals interesting to all the participants.…”

“…22 During the session, each of the present member critically appraises the article and highlights the important aspects of the publication. 46,47,51 The session should end with a conclusion and the leader should summarize all the key findings. Finally, to sustain the benefits of medical education journal clubs, it is wise to periodically evaluate the initiative by obtaining feedback from the participants.…”

“…The medical education journal clubs have been linked with several benefits as depicted in two of the research findings. [45][46][47][48][49][50][51] In a study done in King Saud University, it was reported that medical education journal clubs are accounted for better knowledge acquisition in the field and had a positive impact on the expectations of the trainee students. 48 On a similar note, a study done in Mexico revealed that the students who participated in the medical education journal clubs reported better skills in critical appraisal and the use of available evidence in the educational practice.…”

Pharmacy Club: A Model for Organizing a Regular Forum for Science and Research Communication in Higher Education Institutions in Resource-Limited Settings.

“…In one of the de nitions, extracurricular activities are de ned as "academic or non-academic activities that are conducted under the auspices of the school but occur outside of normal classroom time and are not part of the curriculum" (Bartkus et al 2012). For instance journal club (Topf et al 2017) can be an example of such extracurricular academic activities and it is widely known to improve knowledge and skills in the medical eld (Sánchez-Mendiola et al 2015) and academic institutions.…”