Building a student learning-focused assessment and grading system in dental school: One school's experience.

Purpose/objectives: As health professions education moves toward competency-based education, there has been increased focus on the structure of assessment systems that support student competency development and learning. This has been buoyed by a growing body of research supporting assessment for learning processes to promote student growth and learning rather than relying on assessment systems primarily to measure performance. This paper presents the rationale and evidence for moving to an assessment for learning system and the results of a quasi-experimental interrupted time series study using data from 2015 to 2022 to evaluate the impacts of these changes.

Twelve tips on guiding preparation for both high-stakes exams and long-term learning.

High-stakes exams including admissions, licensing, and maintenance of certification examinations are commonplace in health professions education. Although exam scores and performance can often serve gate-keeping purposes, the broader goal of health professions education is to foster deep, self-directed, meaningful, motivated learning. Establishing strong support structures that emphasize deep learning and understanding rather than exam scores can be beneficial to preparing learners who have the knowledge base to be excellent practitioners.

Informed consent for cardiac procedures: deficiencies in patient comprehension with current methods.

Background: Patients who undergo cardiac catheterization or percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) often have a poor understanding of their disease and of related therapeutic risks, benefits, and alternatives. This pilot study was undertaken to compare the effectiveness of 2 preprocedural educational approaches to enhance patients' knowledge of standard consent elements.

Methods: Patients undergoing first-time elective, outpatient cardiac catheterization and possible PCI were randomly assigned to a scripted verbal or written consent process (group I) or a web-based, audiovisual presentation (group II).