The future of medical student education in internal medicine

The Effect of Computerized Provider Order Entry on Medical Student Clerkship Experiences

“…17 Technology has been successfully used to support medical student education, particularly in the preclinical years, 18 and some observers have proposed that CPOE and decision support can be powerful educational tools for medical students. 19 Medical students are computer literate, 20 are comfortable with using computer-based resources to further their own education, 21,22 and seem to have favorable opinions about CPOE. 23 Others have expressed concern that CPOE may negatively affect students' learning experiences, because (i) housestaff may have less time to teach if it takes more time for them to enter orders using CPOE, 24 (ii) it may take longer to review medical student orders on the computer as opposed to in the chart, 24,25 (iii) attendings may not be adept at computerized ordering and therefore unable to offer guidance to students around ordering issues, 24 and (iv) predetermined order sets may undermine the educational process by reducing the need to think through each order as it is placed.…”

Evaluating the Impact of Computerized Provider Order Entry on Medical Students Training at Bedside: A Randomized Controlled Trial

“…[ 4 – 6 ] Although CPOE can facilitate medical prescription and reduce serious medication error rates by more than half [ 7 – 12 ], few studies have addressed the impact of CPOE on the students’ medical training and ability to place sound orders, despite the indication that it could be useful, particularly through the immediate feedback about the placed order. [ 13 – 18 ] These trials yielded negative results, yet they provide insights on the possible causes of failure: lack of randomization, of time and investment from the supervisors, focus on a specialty, factors of confusion such as the addition of learning material in both groups, or a method of evaluation which did not capture the beneficial effect of the intervention.…”