Journal of Medical Education
Volume:8 Issue: 1, Feb 2006

Background and To measure the status of academic advising in medical schools, the present study was designed at the Secretariat for Education and Student Affairs of the Ministry of Health and Medical Education. A benchmarking tool, to assess the quality of different aspects of that field was devised. Every school was asked to introduce a representative who would complete a questionnaire, which was designed to collect schools’ information. All the divisions were visited by one of the project’s members to revise and approve the data. Then data retrieval was performed, verified and analyzed at the project’s office. There are 45 public and private medical schools nationwide, which were stratified based on their individual scores for academic advising.

Background and pupose: Evidence based medicine bas become on increasing important topic in recent years in medical schools. The internal medicine residents as important group in managing patient need evidences for better diagnosis and treatment. Our intension was to investigate view and understanding of evidence-based medicine (EBM) among internal medicine residents. in 3 teaching hospital in shiraz university of medical school in Iran, a questionnaire was give to internal medicine residents to determine their view about EBM and their ability to access, use and interpret evidences. The overall response rate was 80% (40/50). The result showed that 90% of them had previously received education in research methodology but none of them had a course about EBM.All of residents had access to MEDLINE and word web wide (www) in work place but their use isn’t favorable. Only 10% of them thought they able to critically evaluate medical literatures. The ability to evaluate the literature and apply methods of data analysis, should be educate to all trainees.

Background and Decreased males’ motivation for entering universities has caused a low male/female ratio in different university majors. In 2005-2006 academic year, enrollment of female students in Rafsanjan University of Medical Sciences reached 83.14%. This tremendous gender imbalance may lead to the development of a mono-sex system for health service providers and will.affect the social health system. As females constitute the majority of students.in all medical sciences majors, in this study academic achievement of girls is compared to that-of the boys. This cross-sectional study was performed on 114 medical and 50 dentistry students who were enrolled at Rafsanjan University of Medical Sciences in thespring of 2003. Grade-point average (GPA) was used as a marker for academic achievement. The scores were classified into 3 groups; A (17-20), B (14-16.99) and C (less than 13.99). Data were analyzed by Chi-square test. This study indicated that not only girls constitute the majority of students in the Medicine and Dentistry majors, but also the academic achievement of girls was significantly higher than that of the boys. Among medical students only 2.7% of the boys had A scores, while 18.2% of the girls had A scores. Furthermore, among dentistry students, none of the male students had A scores while 8% of the girls had an A score. It seems that the observed differences, are not related to academic intelligence. These differences may have originated from the decreased motivation in male students for studying efficiently after the enrollment.

Background and Evaluation of faculty members is a kind of educational evaluation to determine success of faculty members in reaching the educational goals. Regarding the controversy about the validity of this kind of evaluation, this study was done to examine faculty members and students view point about content and implementation of evaluation of faculty members by students and feedback of the results in the second term of academic year 2003-4 in Birjand University of Medicine. All faculty members and students participated in this descriptive study. Their opinions were studied using two questionnaires for students and faculty members separately, whose content validity were confirmed after a survey from specialists and pilot study and reliability of results were studied through calculating Cronbach’s alpha coefficient for internal consistency. Data were analyzed through calculating frequencies and K2-test, α=0.05. Of all faculty members, 95% (30 from clinical and 30 from non clinical departments) were aware of having been evaluated by students, 81.7% of them recognize educational development center of the University as the responsible body for evaluation. 91.7% of them received the feedback of the evaluation results. 45% of them agreed that announcement of evaluation results was helpful to improve teaching. 40% believed that questionnaires were responded without dutifulness and carefulness by students. The aim of teaching evaluation is to improve teaching by faculty members. But it seems that many faculty members do not regard this evaluation tool so valid for measuring their teaching activities. The inappropriateness of most of the questionnaires, unfair judgment of student, and careless selection of the sample of students who answer the questionnaires are major issues for further development.

Background and Lesson plan is considered a vital component of the teacher training and successful teachers are in variably good planners and thinkers. The present study was conducted to survey the academic staff’s views about lesson plan in Shiraz University of Medical Sciences in 2001. Moreover, considering the finding of the study there was an attempt to seek the experts’ views on how to perform lesson plan practically through forming a focus group. This is a descriptive study indicating the attitudes of 152 academic staff about lesson plan. The data were collected using a questionnaire. The findings of the first stage was followed by forming a focus group in the second stage. Ten authorities and experts in the field were selected. They wereinterviewed on how to perform lesson plans in Shiraz university of Medical Sciences in three sessions..It was concluded that the main barrier for designing and performing the lesson plan is the academic staff’s lack of awareness about its advantages. Of the population under the study, 30% were females and 70% males. The majority of the academic staff (126 individuals, 85.1%) believes that they need a lesson plan in their field and that the implementation of lesson plan contributes to the improvement of education. 70.9% (1.5) of them believe that lesson plan does not limit the educational process. Some of their coworkers (51.5%) consider lesson plan as necessary and are ready to cooperate in this way. 44.6% of them (42) statethat designing a lesson plan somehow conforms to our country’s educational system. The majority of them (75.8%) state that they know the “must learns” but believe that there is no sufficient education about lesson plan. The experts in the focus group presented their recommendations with regard to lesson plan as follows:1- Continual education of the academic staff; 2- Compilations of logbook; 3- Application of those sections with lesson plan; 4- Compulsory regulations for using lesson in university. The findings of this study reveal that the academic staffs have a positive view about lesson plan. However, their active participation in designing and implementing lesson plan requires educational programs to be compiled. This entails special managerial strategies.

Background and The aim of this research is to determine the factors contributing to academic attrition among day – course students of Lorestan university of medical sciences. In this case – control study all the day – course students who had at least one semester of an average mark under 12 in academic year 2000-2001 were chosen and then the same number of students with an average mark over 15 were selected randomly as control group. Data gathered using GHQ questionnaire for measurement of mental health and study satisfaction questionnaire, as well as variables such as average mark, family economic status and their study files information which are saved in computer were used too. Of all students participated in this study, 41 students had been failed during last year, including 24 females (58.54%) and 17 males (41.46%) considering the proportion of female and male students, academic attrition in male students (6.69%), in comparison with female students, (3.66%) is higher. From viewpoint of age, it was determined that there were a negative correlation between age andaverage mark (r= -0.49). Analysis of results showed that there exist relationship between marital status and academic attrition (p<0.05), but no relation found between accommodation place (dormitory and non - dormitory) and academic attrition. From 41 failed students, 16 cases (40%) were students of medicine and the least rate of academic attrition related to student of anesthesia. There was a significant difference between case and control groups from viewpoint of anxiety (p<0.05).Results indicate that failure rate is observed more among Shahed quota students. No significant relationship was there between satisfaction from field of study and average mark. And between socio – economic level and academic attrition there was 0.18 correlation. Regarding the above mentioned results, academic attrition in students is a multi–factorial phenomenon and different factors such as students’ mental health during study in university must be taken into account, and also it is suggested to exert age limitation from certain fields of study such medicine because results of this study showed that there is a negative relation between age and academic attrition.

Background and Pupose:After two decades of expansion of universities of medical sciences and increasing the number of medical sciences students as one of the most attainable solutions for the problem of substandard status of Iranian community health, recently, quality-based policies in medical education have taken priority over most of the national health plans. We conducted this study to determine differences in the field of education between Iranian dental schools by stratifying their educational services. To measure the educational performance that could be utilized to rate the schools nationwide, a benchmarking tool, consisting of about 60 indicators, was devised. Each school was asked to introduce a representative who would complete a questionnaire, which was designed to collect schools’ information. In the next step, all the divisions were visited by one of the project’s members and the school’s representative to revise and approve the data. Then, data retrieval was performedand verified at the project’s office. Finally, a special computer software was exploited to perform the final analysis. There were 18 public and private dental schools nationwide, which were stratified based on their individual scores. Furthermore, all schools were also ranked in each indicator. This study as one of the phases of Strategy Compilation for Educational Missions of the National System of Medical Education, defines the educational strengths and weaknesses of Iranian dental schools that could be used as a measure for authorities to determine the developmental limits and current stance of these schools; and optimize their budget and facilities..

Back ground and Continuing education is one of priorities of newly graduates from medicine and selection of a proper residency program is a major problem for most of them. This study examined various motives and reasons for inclination of graduates from medicine to continue education in a special residency program and become specialized. This is a cross-sectional study. A questionnaire was developed after holding a focus group. Validity and reliability of results using the questionnaire were assessed, Then the questionnaires were sent and received by free mail through universities. Chi-Suquare, One way ANOVA and Post Hoc test, Bonferroni type, was used to study relationships Between different variables. 1052 residents participated in the study. Response rate was 27%. The first and second most important information sources used to choose a residency program were experts and related books (like ketab-e-sabz) respectively. 303(28.8%) Of participants a greed that they need information a bout future of their specialties of choice. The most important factors influencing selection of a program,ordered according to their importance, were tangibility of the impacts of patients treatment, types of diseases, variety in a program, previous academic extensive job opportunities. This study showed there are various reasons to select a residency program. However information and awareness of resident a bout the program they chosed was not sufficient. Therefore informing residents before choosing programs seems to be necessary.