Interdisciplinary Journal of Virtual Learning in Medical Sciences
Volume:3 Issue: 2, 2012

Users of hospital information systems deal with these systems on a daily basis; therefore, they are completely familiar with their positive and negative aspects. We aimed to determine the viewpoints of different users on the hospital information system in Nemazee hospital, Shiraz, southern Iran. This cross-sectional study is based on descriptive-analytical methods. The statistical population comprised users of hospital information systems. Data collection was done using related questionnaires. Data were analyzed using SPSS software for descriptive and analytical statistics. One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA), Pearson’s correlation coefficient, and t tests were used as appropriated. The participants’ overall attitude scores were nearly below the average level. Individuals with a diploma degree (mean score=31.3) had the highest negative attitude while those with a bachelor’s degree (mean score=63.6) had the highest positive attitude towards the hospital information system. Moreover, the corresponding score for individuals with an associate degree was 51.2.The most positive attitude belongs to those whose major was medicine or statistics with an average of 71.7%. However those who worked in drugstores had the most negative attitude toward this system with an average of 36.6%. Individuals who worked at the medical documents department had the most positive attitude with a mean contentment of 69.4. In the present study any increase in years of service directly influenced positive attitudes towards the application of information software. The individuals’ sex had no significant impact on their attitude towards the hospital information system. Since the users attitudes regarding the hospital information system were negative and this is possibly the main reason for the user's inconsistency with this system, reconsideration and revision in order to enhance the performance and information quality of this system is inevitable.

It is important to consider the students’ perception of clinical learning environments in order to enhance the quality of effective clinical education. We aimed to describe nursing student perceptions of clinical learning experience in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). In this descriptive study, we used an exploratory qualitative approach. Data were collected using reflective journalism. 25 senior nursing students were asked to reflect and describe their learning experience in the NICU through reflective journal writing. The students were encouraged to reflect their desires, opinions, emotions, attitudes, or disapproval in their personal journals. Data were analyzed using constant comparative analysis. We found four main categories which reflected the students’ experience: anxiety regarding skill incompetency, satisfaction with new skills, staff-student relationship, and clinical teacher competency. Positive interpersonal relationship between students, staff, and teachers are important factors for enhancing clinical learning. A clinical teacher must be able to provide students with appropriate knowledge and skills to decrease their anxiety regarding task performance. A clinical instructor needs more clinical experience and knowledge in order to have clinical competency.

It is important to consider the factors affecting learning methods. In recent years, virtual education, as a teaching method to fit the needs of today's society, has been considered and the efficacy of this approach has always been questioned. We aimed to investigate the relationship of personality traits and learning styles with the academic achievement of online students. Senior students of Shiraz e-Learning University (n=195) completed the questionnaires of personality characteristics (NEO-FFI) and Kolb‘s (1984) Learning Styles Inventory. Their final grades were used as indicators to measure academic achievement. Data were analyzed using Pearson's correlation coefficient and logistic regression. We found a significant relationship between personality characteristics and learning methods. Among the personality dimensions, neuroticism and agreeableness and among the learning styles, convergent style learning were able to predict the academic success of students in these courses. Our results were informative with respect to the factors influencing learners. Adapting teaching methods consistent with the students’ characteristics could help educational planners enhance the academic success of the students.

One of the ongoing challenges in educational neuroscience research is to understand how cognitive neuroscience insights and recent acheivements could be used to improve the quality of education in general and medical education in particular. How common is the language of neuroscience, and learning science? The concept of the “schema” has traditionally been considered as the underpinning of any learning behavior. However cognitive neuroscience is trying to unveil how knowledge, insight and experience are being processed in the brain and how distinct neural connections facilitate a new learning process. Encoded data in the hippocampus would potentially have long-lasting neocortical representations and this will form schemas. How could fundamental concepts and neuroscience findings be employed to improve learning and education in medicine? The insights provided by basic and applied research in cognitive neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and learning science, can be promising in improving education including medical education. This article reviews the common areas between neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and medical education.

The learning at anytime and anywhere approach has been actualized by the development of wireless technologies and mobile learning. Mobile learning as the model of e-Learning represents the acquisition of knowledge, skill, and attitude using mobile technology. The aim of this article is to review the perspectives and theories of mobile learning. Initially, we will define mobile learning, it's place in the distance learning system, and the chances and challenges based on this learning. Then, we will study the mobile learning perspectives including: technology, mobility, individualism, ubiquitous learning and e-Learning along with theories of mobile learning including: behaviorism, cognitivism, constructivism, activity theory, problem- based learning, collaborative, conversational, lifelong…; at the end we will discuss future views on mobile learning. In order for mobile learning to be effective, its perspectives and theories need to be explored. If these theories and perspectives are used intelligently we can reach optimal learning solutions required for the 21st century.

Considering the current scientific improvement in the field of rehabilitation and the fact that this field is a combination of theoretical and clinical sciences, the need for modern approaches in academic education is felt more than before. Blended learning is an educational program based on the simultaneous use of several educational methods, which ultimately saves time and money as well as improves the clinical performance. In this method electronic learning is simultaneously used for completing academic lessons, accompanied by additional workshops to create a more effective clinical experience. This review article was carried out by searching websites and using public and professional medical search engines such as Google, PubMed, Science Direct, and Scopus. Keywords related to electronic learning were searched and related articles were extracted and assessed. It seems that needs assessment should be done for different rehabilitation fields (physiotherapy, work therapy, speech therapy, etc.). Also, after considering the cost of the project and the additional workshops, contextualization should be done to meet the needs of the Iranian population. We suggest this type of learning be implemented in order to update the information and the skills of healthcare workers.

Academic research is one of the main concerns of students, professors and academic staff. The variety of different journals and the large amount of publications in a single research field has lead to some degrees of confusion regarding the management of articles for citation. Therefore, reference manager software are becoming increasingly popular. These software are capable of creating a library of articles and documents, categorizing them, as well as providing easy citation methods for authors and researchers. One of these software is the Mendeley. Mendeley can manage and organize research for its users. One of its various advantages over other similar software is that it is free of charge. In this article, we will review the various characteristics of this reference manager. Then we will compare it with other similar software and show that it has a better applicability.