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Medical students' perspective on the teaching of medical statistics in the undergraduate medical curriculum
Author(s) -
Astin Jeremy,
Jenkins Tom,
Moore Laurence
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
statistics in medicine
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.996
H-Index - 183
eISSN - 1097-0258
pISSN - 0277-6715
DOI - 10.1002/sim.1132
Subject(s) - curriculum , medical statistics , medical education , perspective (graphical) , relevance (law) , critical appraisal , psychology , medicine , computer science , alternative medicine , pedagogy , pathology , artificial intelligence , political science , law
Two undergraduate medical students at the University of Bristol commented on their experiences of learning medical statistics. In general, medical students' focus is on acquiring skills needed to practice clinical medicine, and great care must be taken to explain why disciplines such as statistics and epidemiology are relevant to this. Use of real examples and an emphasis on the need for evidence has meant that medical students are increasingly aware of the pressure on clinicians to justify their treatment decisions, and the associated need to be able to understand and critically appraise medical research. It was felt that medical statistics courses should focus on critical appraisal skills rather than on the ability to analyse data, which can be acquired by particular students when they need to do this. Medical statistics should be taught early in the curriculum, but there is a need to reinforce such skills throughout the course. Teaching and assessment methods should recognize that what is being taught is a practical skill of clinical relevance. This means that problem based small groups, data interpretation exercises and objective structured clinical examinations will be more productive than traditional teaching and examination methods. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.