Fourth-year Medical Students as PBL Tutors

Problem-based learning (PBL) is a popular teaching method in medical schools, but is resource intensive due to the large number of faculty required to serve as small group tutors. This study 1) compares the effectiveness and student satisfaction of PBL small groups tutored by physicians with groups tutored by 4th year medical students (MSIVs) and 2) examines the effect of tutoring on learning by MSIVs. Sixteen MSIV students were recruited to tutor MSII groups. Seven MSIVs participated in a separate study to analyze the amount of learning that occurred as a result of teaching. The MSII students were given a quiz after each module to measure the amount of information learned, and a satisfaction survey regarding their tutor. Additionally, the tutors completed a pre-test and a post-test of the material they taught. All data was input into SPSS, a statistical analysis package, and analyzed using an Independent Samples t-test. Results indicated that there was no statistically significant difference in mean quiz scores of the MSII students between groups (those tutored by physicians and those tutored by MSIVs). There was also no statistically significant difference between groups on any of the questions on the satisfaction survey. Furthermore, the MSIV student tutor pre- and post-test scores showed no statistically significant difference although the post-test scores were all higher than the pre-test scores. These findings support the use of MSIV students as PBL tutors. The results also indicated that MSIV students may benefit from teaching MSII students. Additionally, the results suggest that MSIV students may be better prepared and more knowledgeable as physicians when they have been in a position to teach medical students