The Efficacy of Existing Logbooks in Clinical Wards from Medical Student's Viewpoint in Birjand University of Medical Sciences, Iran, in Fall 2016

Logbook is raised as one of the valuable clinical evaluation tools to monitor the achievement of educational goals. This study was done to determine the efficacy of present logbooks in clinical wards from medical student's viewpoint in Birjand University of Medical Sciences, Iran.
This analytical-descriptive study was conducted on 233 medical students in clerkship and internship stages in fall 2016. Data collection instrument was a researcher-made questionnaire including 4 demographic questions, 10 viewpoint questions with a 4-point Likert scale and 2 practice questions; validity and reliability of the questionnaire were confirmed. Questionnaires were completed by all the students in clinical wards using self-administered method. Data was analyzed via SPSS using descriptive and analytical tests.
Findings: Mean age of the students was 24.02 ± 1.45 years. Their mean knowledge score was 0.70 ± 0.69 from 2, mean viewpoint score was 22.62 ± 7.60 from 40, and mean practice score was 2.61 ± 0.92 from 4. Only 24.5 percent said that logbook complement in learning of clinical skills is highly and very highly useful. 70.8 percent expressed that existing logbooks need to be revised. Pearson's test showed significant correlation between mean knowledge score and viewpoint (P = 0.010) and practice (P = 0.030). Kruskal-Wallis test indicated significant difference in mean practice score based on different clinical wards (P = 0.030).
Findings showed that existing logbooks in clinical wards was not efficacious in learning clinical wards skills. Therefore, regarding to logbook role in students learning process, it seems essential to conduct educational workshops for faculty members and students to enhance the knowledge and necessary skills, to design careful implementation, and to revise content of logbooks.