698 Virtual Journal Clubs - An Innovative Student-Led Programme to Develop Critical Analysis Skills for Surgical and Medical Training

Critical analysis skills underpin improvements in surgical practice. Educational institutions and student-led societies seek innovative ways to deliver teaching and enhance these skills. Our student-led society designed a programme of online journal clubs to supplement teaching and encourage development of these skills amongst medical students. This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of virtual journal discussions in evidence-based medicine training. Method Bi-monthly meetings were held online from August-December 2020. A variety of published literature was chosen with different study types. Critical analysis was performed, presented and group discussion was facilitated by a medical student host. Anonymous feedback was collected from attendees via an online form. Results 95 participants attended across 7 sessions. Forty participants, who were from the United Kingdom (n = 36), Bulgaria (n = 3) and Italy (n = 1), consented for inclusion of their responses in this study. We presented 3 SARS-CoV-2, 2 surgical and 2 medical research papers. 52.5% of our participants were final-year medical students. 55% had previously attended physical or online journal clubs. Confidence in critical appraisal was rated from 1 (very poor) to 5 (very good) before and after the session; median score increased from 3 (range 1-4) to 4 (range 3-5). Conclusions We present an innovative method of developing interest and skills in academic surgery and medicine. Feedback from participants has been very positive; we demonstrate these sessions improve self-reported confidence in critical analysis skills. We encourage other institutions to consider providing such sessions for medical students to raise interest in academic surgery.