Designing a simulation-based cardiovascular physiology practical with students as partners

Abstract

<p>Traditional basic science practicals are perceived by some health professionals students to be irrelevant for their future clinical practice. We partnered with three medical students to design a 3-hour practical class, using an open-source simulation of rat cardiovascular system.</p><p>The first half of the practical class was teacher-guided, where students preformed experiments following a set protocol and questions that guide data interpretation. Afterwards, students were taught how to design basic pharmacological experiments, and then designed own experiments to answer a clinically relevant problem. The practical class concluded with a large-class debriefing session.</p><p>The practical class was formally taught to first-year medical students in February 2023. The practical was evaluated using validated instruments for evaluating situational motivation (Guay et al., 2000) and perceived usefulness of the learning activity (Herbert et al., 2017). A total of 317 surveys was disseminated, and 57 valid responses were received (response rate=17.98%). For situational motivation (7-point Likert scale), the mean scores (± SD) for intrinsic motivation (IM), identified regulation (IR), external regulation (ER) and amotivation (AM) were 5.1 (±1.1), 5.5 (±0.9), 4.5 (±1.1) and 2.8 (±1.1), respectively. This suggests significant self-motivation amongst the survey respondents.</p><p>When asked to self-rate their understanding of the topic before and after the activity in a score out of 10, the mean score (± SD) before the activity was 4.9 (±1.6), and after the activity was 7.0 (±1.5). The increment was statistically significant (p < 0.001), suggesting that the activity improved students’ perceived understanding of the topic.</p>