Primary care in rural areas: a qualitative study on medical students' images and experiences of working in rural areas in southern Germany.

Background: Rural areas are increasingly moving back into the focus of social research, especially in the context of health care. As the shortage of general practitioners (GP) in rural areas is a significant challenge in Germany, there are several programs to counteract underuse effectively, acutely, and sustainably. One of those programs is 'Beste Landpartie Allgemeinmedizin' (BeLA), which was developed to strengthen primary care in rural areas and to sustainably promote young doctors to work as general practitioners in rural regions through didactical and financial support.

'You Also Have to Let People Go'-Effects of Formative Experiences with Dying and Death on Medical Trainees' Attitudes.

This study investigates the effects of medical students' and residents' formative patient death experiences on their understanding of the role of the physician in dealing with dying patients. Analyses revealed a change in attitude, an acceptance of death as 'part of life'. Thoughtful and comprehensive care, allowing patients to die and enabling them to have a beautiful death, were identified as the physician's duty.

Insights into the meaning of medical students' studies. An online survey at two medical faculties.

Objective: The aim of the study was to investigate how medical students' deal with their own questions of meaning during their studies, how they cope with patients' questions of meaning or crises of meaning, to what extent their experience of meaning changes during their studies, and what role medical studies play in this.

Methods: In 2022, we conducted an exploratory cross-sectional study in the form of an online survey at two German universities with students in the clinical part of their studies. Quantitative data were analyzed descriptively, and group differences were analyzed using Mann-Whitney U tests.

Seeing with Different Eyes. The Module of the Elite-Master Program Biomedical Neuroscience.

From its beginnings in 2018, the international elite-master program of at was guided by two convictions: First, excellent research depends not only on the mediation of scientific knowledge and skills, but also on a multifaceted understanding of science itself. Second, teaching must recognize and support not only student's growing expertise but also their personal and professional development. To this end, the module was designed.

Training in medical communication competence through video-based e-learning: How effective are video modeling and video reflection?

Objective: The present study investigated the efficacy of the didactic approaches of video modeling (VM, best-practice examples), video reflection (VR, problem-based approach), and the combination of both (VMR) in fostering medical communication competence in a video-based digital learning environment.

Methods: N = 126 third-year medical students who participated in the pre-post study were assigned to either the intervention groups (VM, VR, and VMR) or the wait-list control group. The efficacy of the three approaches was assessed by means of a situational judgment test (SJT) of medical communication competence.

Structure and quality of bedside teaching: A videographic analysis.

Bedside teaching (BST) is a core element of medical education. In light of a reported decrease in BST, evidence on how to use BST time most efficiently should be developed. Given that little research into the tangible quality characteristics of good BST has been reported, we investigated the influence of various teacher and structural characteristics on the perceived quality of BST.

Experiences of medical students and nursing trainees from unexpected death through simulation training.

Background: Dying in simulation training is controversially discussed. On the one hand, the danger of an emotional overload of the learners is pointed out. On the other hand, dying in simulation settings is addressed as an opportunity to prepare future health professionals to deal with patient death.

Measuring informal workplace learning outcomes in residency training: a validation study.

Background: Informal workplace learning (WPL) has no concrete learning objective and takes place without a responsible supervisor, which makes it difficult to assess its learning outcomes. Formal learning situations, as they are known from universities or schools, do not exist in this context and make a conventional assessment of learning goals and achievements impossible. Informal learning in the workplace is of central importance, and the assessment of informal learning outcomes in medical education is an under-researched area.

OPEN Hackathon at the TUM School of Medicine, Germany.

The OPEN Hackathon of the Technical University of Munich (TUM) 2020 set out to address challenges and potential solutions for medical education at the School of Medicine to kick off the 2020/21 winter semester. The event lasted 36 hours, during which medical students, teachers and staff members had the opportunity to tackle current problems in education and to develop co-created, customized solutions through creative teamwork for the School of Medicine at the TUM. The resulting solutions are now being realized and implemented in teaching.

Professional Identity and Motivation for Medical School in First-Year Medical Students: A Cross-sectional Study.

Background: Professional identity formation (PIF) is a life-long process, starting even before professional education. High levels of motivation for medical school are essential for effective learning and academic success. Both are key factors in future physicians' professional and personal development, and according to self-determination theory, professional identity (PI) and students' levels of motivation could be closely linked.

Development and internal validation of an instrument to measure the motivation of residents for family medicine.

Background: For several decades, medical school graduates' motivation to specialise in family medicine is decreasing. Therefore, residents in family medicine must be motivated for the profession and finish their residency.

Objectives: Goal of the current study is the development and internal validation of an instrument to measure the residents' motivation for family medicine, which is based on the self-determination theory: STRength mOtivatioN General practitioner (STRONG).

Student mistakes and teacher reactions in bedside teaching.

We analyse interactions between teachers and students during video-recorded bedside teaching sessions in internal medicine, orthopaedics and neurology. Multiple raters used a high-inference categorical scheme on 36 sessions. Our research questions concern the types of student mistakes, clinical teachers' reactions to them and if they use different strategies to address different types of mistakes.

Implicit expression of uncertainty in medical students during different sequences of clinical reasoning in simulated patient handovers.

Background: Dealing with medical uncertainty is an essential competence of physicians. During handovers, communication of uncertainty is important for patient safety, but is often not explicitly expressed and can hamper medical decisions. This study examines medical students' implicit expression of uncertainty in different sequences of clinical reasoning during simulated patient handovers.

Is there an increase over time in the complexity of teacher questions and student responses in case-based clinical seminars? A cross-sectional video study.

Background: Case-based group discussions (CBGD) are a specific, interaction-focused format dedicated to fostering medical students' skills in applying basic biomedical knowledge to patient cases. Existing conceptions of CBGD suggest that a gradient towards increased opportunities for students to make elaborative verbal contributions is an important element of such seminars. To verify this assumption, we investigate empirically if clinical teachers progress from more basic, knowledge-oriented questions towards more advanced, elaboration-oriented questions in such seminars.

How is modern bedside teaching structured? A video analysis of learning content, social and spatial structures.

Background: Bedside teaching (BST) is an essential and traditional clinical teaching format. It has been subject to various impediments and has transformed over time. Besides a decrease in bedside time, there has also been a didactic diversification.

The WFME global standards for quality improvement of postgraduate medical education: Which standards are also applicable in Germany? Recommendations for physicians with a license for postgraduate training and training agents.

In Germany, the (model) regulation for postgraduate medical education 2018, the professional codes of conduct of the regional medical councils and the health professions chamber laws of the federal states are the formal basis of postgraduate medical education, but say little about its structure, processes and results. The World Federation for Medical Education (WFME) has developed global standards for improving the quality of postgraduate medical education and published them in a revised edition in 2015. A German version which takes the specifics of medical training in Germany into account has not been published to date.

Medical Students and Their Perceptions of Digital Medicine: a Question of Gender?

Digital technologies play an essential role in the medical sector of today and the future. In a cross-sectional online survey at a German medical university, male students more frequently reported keeping themselves informed about digital medicine outside of their studies across all clinical years of study. While female students self-assessed their knowledge in different fields of digital medicine as worse than their male peers in the first clinical years of study, no more gender differences could be found towards the final year.

Programs to encourage working as a general practitioner in rural areas: why do medical students not want to participate? A cross-sectional study.

Background: In many countries, not enough students are interested to work as general practitioners in rural areas. To solve this problem, several, sometimes partly extracurricular, programs have been developed. Most of these programs are based on continuity, which means that students stay in a rural region for an extended period of time, by completing clerkships.

Changes in medical students´ and anesthesia technician trainees´ attitudes towards interprofessionality - experience from an interprofessional simulation-based course.

Background: Interprofessional simulation based education (IPSBE) programs positively impact participants' attitudes towards interprofessional collaboration and learning. However, the extent to which students in different health professions benefit and the underlying reasons for this are subject of ongoing debate.

Methods: We developed a 14-h IPSBE course with scenarios of critical incidents or emergency cases.

How to... train your skills goes digital! A project report on the development and implementation of practice-oriented digital student tutorials.

This project report outlines the development and implementation of digital tutorials ("How to...

Frequency of medical students' language expressing implicit uncertainty in simulated handovers.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to investigate the number and type of implicit expressions of uncertainty by medical students during simulated patient handovers.

Methods: Eighty-seven volunteer medical students, a convenience sample collected on a first-come, first-served basis, participated in simulated handovers. They each worked with three simulated patients who presented with different chief complaints and personal conditions.

[The importance of the learning environment and reduction of burnout in clinical training: an analysis of the Competence Centre for Residency Training in Family Medicine Bavaria (CCRTB)].

Background: The Competence Centre for Residency Training in Family Medicine Bavaria (CCRTB) was established to improve the quality of postgraduate medical training by offering additional seminars and mentoring programmes as well as regular 'train-the-trainer' courses for educating physicians. In addition, residents have the opportunity to participate in a regional training network.

Objective: The aim was to assess the burden of burnout and the importance of the learning environment in the clinical training phase.