The retrospective pre-post: a practical method to evaluate learning from an educational program.

Objectives:   Program evaluation remains a critical but underutilized step in medical education. This study compared traditional and retrospective pre-post self-assessment methods to objective learning measures to assess which correlated better to actual learning.

Methods:   Forty-seven medical students participated in a 4-hour pediatric resuscitation course.

Paediatric resuscitation training--do medical students believe it should be a mandatory component of the curriculum?

Background: Resuscitation outcomes are related to care delivered by 'first responders', even for hospitalized patients. Third year medical students (clinical clerks) at McGill University are trained and certified in Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) for critically ill adult patients, but receive only minimal instruction, in the form of a brief introductory lecture, on paediatric life support.

Methods: We developed an interactive, case-based 4-h Paediatric Resuscitation Course based on the objectives and teaching methods of the Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) course.

Learning while evaluating: the use of an electronic evaluation portfolio in a geriatric medicine clerkship.

Background: Electronic evaluation portfolios may play a role in learning and evaluation in clinical settings and may complement other traditional evaluation methods (bedside evaluations, written exams and tutor-led evaluations).

Methods: 133 third-year medical students used the McGill Electronic Evaluation Portfolio (MEEP) during their one-month clerkship rotation in Geriatric Medicine between September 2002 and September 2003. Students were divided into two groups, one who received an introductory hands-on session about the electronic evaluation portfolio and one who did not.