Introducing Family Medicine Clerkship to Medical Students' Curriculum at a Saudi Medical University: An Impact Study

Abstract

Background: Family Medicine was introduced as a major undergraduate clinical rotation in 2016 after the medical college at Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University revised its curriculum.

Objective: Assessing how students' medical knowledge has improved post Family Medicine introduction to the revised medical school curriculum.

Study design: This was a cross-sectional epidemiological study among fifth year clinical medical students (n = 219). A pretest and post-test was distributed to all fifth year clinical medical students voluntarily during the period of October 2017 to May 2018. They were asked to rate the exam as well.

Results: The mean exam grades were 25.52 (SD = 4.44) and 34.16 (SD = 5.76) for pre-rotation and post-rotation, respectively. There was a statistically significant difference between post and pre rotation exam grade for the overall sample (t (218) = 23.73, P < .0001) indicating that students had a statistically significantly higher exam grades post-rotation (M = 34.16, SD = 5.76) than pre-rotation (M = 25.52, SD = 4.44). Females had a statistically significantly larger difference in post-rotation and pre-rotation exam grade than males indicating that they improved more in the post rotation exam. It was found that nearly 60% (59.36%) of subjects considered the exam difficult before the rotation; however, only around 40% (40.18%) considered the exam difficult after the rotation.

Conclusion: Students benefited after taking the course of family medicine. This helps in advocating for both the importance of this specialty and for the university's decision in incorporating family medicine as a major clinical rotation for undergraduates.

Keywords: curriculum; family medicine; medical education; medical students.

Figure 1.

Box plots of exam grades (pre-rotation grade, post-rotation grade, and difference between post and pre rotation exam grade (post-pre)), overall where endpoint of upper whisker represents maximum, upper edge of box represents the third quartile (75th percentile), line inside box represents median (50th percentile), symbol marker represents mean, lower edge of box represents the first quartile (25th percentile), and endpoint of lower whisker represents minimum.