Medical student preferences for self‐directed study resources in gross anatomy

Abstract

Gross anatomy instruction in medical curricula involve a range of resources and activities including dissection, prosected specimens, anatomical models, radiological images, surface anatomy, textbooks, atlases, and computer-assisted learning (CAL). These resources and activities are underpinned by the expectation that students will actively engage in self-directed study (SDS) to enhance their knowledge and understanding of anatomy. To gain insight into preclinical versus clinical medical students' preferences for SDS resources for learning gross anatomy, and whether these vary on demographic characteristics and attitudes toward anatomy, students were surveyed at two Australian medical schools, one undergraduate-entry and the other graduate-entry. Lecture/tutorial/practical notes were ranked first by 33% of 156 respondents (mean rank ± SD, 2.48 ± 1.38), textbooks by 26% (2.62 ± 1.35), atlases 20% (2.80 ± 1.44), videos 10% (4.34 ± 1.68), software 5% (4.78 ± 1.50), and websites 4% (4.24 ± 1.34). Among CAL resources, Wikipedia was ranked highest. The most important factor in selecting CAL resources was cost (ranked first by 46%), followed by self-assessment, ease of use, alignment with curriculum, and excellent graphics (each 6-9%). Compared with preclinical students, clinical students ranked software and Acland's Video Atlas of Human Anatomy higher and felt radiological images were more important in selecting CAL resources. Along with other studies reporting on the quality, features, and impact on learning of CAL resources, the diversity of students' preferences and opinions on usefulness and ease of use reported here can help guide faculty in selecting and recommending a range of CAL and other resources to their students to support their self-directed study.

Factors influencing undergraduate students’ acceptance of a haptic interface for learning gross anatomy

“…This is an impressive result for the LAHFS, given that participants used it for only once for 10-15 minutes. The rank order of other resources were similar to rankings in other studies (Choi-Lundberg et al, 2015;Azer and Eizenberg, 2007;Kerby et al, 2011;Zurada et al, 2011;Johnson et al, 2013). To achieve a middle-ranking position in such fleeting circumstances implies the LAHFS has the potential to become even more highly favoured.…”

“…Providing and recommending a wide variety of learning resources, to suit learners with diverse learning preferences, may help students gain a variety of perspectives, integrate information from several learning resources, and extend their own learning approaches (Azer et al, 2013;Choi-Lundberg et al, 2015). In the present study, as well as data from over 140,000 respondents on the VARK website, the kinaesthetic responses are the most frequent at 29% compared to 22-26% for V, A, and R (VARK Learn Limited, 2016).…”

“…The majority of participants were Bachelor of Medicine / Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) students; gross anatomy teaching in this course has been described previously (Choi-Lundberg et al, 2015. Additionally, Bachelor of Computing (BComp) students participated in user test 1.…”

Teaching anatomy in a modern medical course: an integrated approach at Vialba Medical School in Milan

“…These data are not contradictory. Undoubtedly, medical imaging inserted in the course of anatomy could lead to stimulate and support the understanding of gross anatomy by teaching the anatomy from two perspectives and by reinforcing the clinical relevance of anatomy, but it is, at least in part, an inadequate tool for the self-study (Chapman 2013;Choi-Lundberg 2016).…”

Student Perceptions to Teaching Undergraduate Anatomy in Health Sciences

“…The favorability of lectures is often overwhelming, with students often agreeing that they were more beneficial than self-directed learning (Davis et al, 2014). Despite the push for more active modes of learning, these responses have shown that more traditional modes of delivery cannot be entirely ignored when developing curricula in anatomy and physiology (Choi-Lundberg, Low, Patman, Turner, & Sinha, 2016;Minhas, Ghosh, & Swanzy, 2012). Furthermore, it should be acknowledged that no singular approach (lectures, dissection/prosection, models, technology or living anatomy) fulfills all teaching objectives, thus a multimodal approach is best (Kerby et al, 2011).…”