Effects of geriatric clinical skills training on the attitudes of medical students.

Goeldlin, Adrian O; Siegenthaler, Andrea; Moser, André; Stoeckli, Yvette D; Stuck, Andreas E; Schoenenberger, Andreas W (2014). Effects of geriatric clinical skills training on the attitudes of medical students. BMC medical education, 14, p. 233. BioMed Central 10.1186/1472-6920-14-233

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BACKGROUND

Physicians' attitudes, knowledge and skills are powerful determinants of quality of care for older patients. Previous studies found that using educational interventions to improve attitude is a difficult task. No previous study sought to determine if a skills-oriented educational intervention improved student attitudes towards elderly patients.

METHODS

This study evaluated the effect of a geriatric clinical skills training (CST) on attitudes of University of Bern medical students in their first year of clinical training. The geriatric CST consisted of four 2.5-hour teaching sessions that covered central domains of geriatric assessment (e.g., cognition, mobility), and a textbook used by students to self-prepare. Students' attitudes were the primary outcome, and were assessed with the 14-item University of California at Los Angeles Geriatrics Attitudes Scale (UCLA-GAS) in a quasi-randomized fashion, either before or after geriatric CST.

RESULTS

A total of 154 medical students participated. Students evaluated before the CST had a median UCLA-GAS overall scale of 49 (interquartile range 44-53). After the CST, the scores increased slightly, to 51 (interquartile range 47-54; median difference 2, 95% confidence interval 0-4, P = 0.062). Of the four validated UCLA-GAS subscales, only the resource distribution subscale was significantly higher in students evaluated after the geriatric CST (median difference 1, 95% confidence interval 0-2, P = 0.005).

CONCLUSIONS

Teaching that targets specific skills may improve the attitudes of medical students towards elderly patients, though the improvement was slight. The addition of attitude-building elements may improve the effectiveness of future skills-oriented educational interventions.

Item Type:

Journal Article (Original Article)

Division/Institute:

04 Faculty of Medicine > Department of General Internal Medicine (DAIM) > Geriatric Clinic > Geriatric Clinic Inselspital
04 Faculty of Medicine > Department of General Internal Medicine (DAIM) > Geriatric Clinic
04 Faculty of Medicine > Pre-clinic Human Medicine > Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine (ISPM)
04 Faculty of Medicine > Department of General Internal Medicine (DAIM) > Clinic of General Internal Medicine
04 Faculty of Medicine > Department of General Internal Medicine (DAIM) > Clinic of General Internal Medicine > Centre of Competence for General Internal Medicine
04 Faculty of Medicine > Pre-clinic Human Medicine > BioMedical Research (DBMR) > DCR Unit Sahli Building > Forschungsgruppe Geriatrie/Altersmedizin

UniBE Contributor:

Göldlin, Adrian, Siegenthaler, Andrea Eva, Moser, André, Stuck, Andreas, Schoenenberger, Andreas

Subjects:

600 Technology > 610 Medicine & health
300 Social sciences, sociology & anthropology > 360 Social problems & social services

ISSN:

1472-6920

Publisher:

BioMed Central

Language:

English

Submitter:

Doris Kopp Heim

Date Deposited:

06 Nov 2014 17:03

Last Modified:

05 Dec 2022 14:38

Publisher DOI:

10.1186/1472-6920-14-233

PubMed ID:

25342579

BORIS DOI:

10.7892/boris.59943

URI:

https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/59943

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