Shouman Summer Training – Egypt (IFMSA-Egypt)

Name of the activity: Shouman Summer Training

Country/NMO: Egypt (IFMSA-Egypt)

Program: Teaching Medical Skills

Contact information: [email protected]

Type of the activity: Capacity Building

General description:

Shouman Summer Training is a student-organizer clinical training for the 3rd and 4th year students at Mansoura faculty of medicine. The training aims at exposing the students about to start their clinical studies to the patients and clinicians through a two-week in-hospital training ranging from 35 to 45 hours depending on the department in which the training takes place.
Under supervision of the medical education unit, the training is organized by Mansoura Students’ Scientific Association (MSSA) volunteers making them able to learn about their education system and its challenged, and giving them an opportunity to gain basic skills related to medical education including curriculum design and assessment.
Run for its 6th time, the training served around 300 medical students in 13 different clinical department with standardized transferable skills and variable hand skills depending on the training department.
At the end of the training, when students were asked if they need a better clinical training, they answered YES and would love it if it were like the one we organizes yearly.

Focus area:

First Aid/CPR/BLS, Surgical Skills, History Taking, Diagnostic measures, Clinical Examination, Doctor-Patient communication skills, Diagnostic tests interpretation, Soft Skills for medical practitioners, Research basics for medical practitioners

Problem statement:

The skills of patient interviewing and physical examination form the foundation for effective doctoring. Lack of clinical skills is often a source of insecurity for physician and represents potential danger for the patient. (1)
Clinical skills in “traditionally oriented” medical schools are usually learned by watching what clinicians do, by interviewing and examining patients, and by presenting findings to a
supervisor. (2)
Training medical students to provide patient care requires that they gain competence in core clinical skills. These skills include proficiency in history taking and physical examination, oral and written communication, clinical procedures, basic radiology, evidence- based medicine, and professionalism. (3)

The transition that students face while moving from the preclinical to the clinical setting is extraordinarily stressful; students feel anxious and unprepared for this transition. The stress that students experience relates to the sharp differences in the learning environments, teaching styles, workload, and performance expectations between the preclinical and clinical arenas.
Preparing students to transition the clinical training environment of clerkships continues to challenge educators. (4)
A study (5) was conducted at king Abdulaziz University to assess the efficacy of clinical skills training on the performance and perception of the 4th year medical students that showed
the following : https://goo.gl/hFYF1M
Given such importance, it is not surprising that courses teaching these skills are a must in all medical schools curricula.
As part of Mansoura faculty of medicine efforts to provide its students a better
opportunities to be more promising future physicians, an extracurricular clinical skills training is provided to the students to help them utilize their summer vacation more fruitfully and more successfully. We have been giving such a training to students in the so called transition state; so that it can help them overcome that transition safely.
Hence, an extracurricular clinical skills training for students in the 3rd and 4th
years in our faculty will make a very fruitful impact not only on the students’ skills but on their next clinical years’ education as well.
So, the faculty of Medicine at Mansoura University has been providing those students with extracurricular medical training for 5 years now, named Shouman Summer Training (SST). It is an annual summer medical training that had been coordinated by the Students’ Union under the title of The Summer Training and it became Shouman Summer Training (SST) to honor the memory of our colleague Ahmed Shouman who passed away in 2011, may Allah bless his soul.
During the term 2011-2012, this project has been a partnership and coordination between the students’ union and Mansoura students’ scientific association (MSSA) aiming at helping 200 students in our school & developing their medical skills to be professional future Physicians.
Since the term 2012-2013 this training has been taking place under patronage and direct supervision of Mansoura faculty of medicine administration represented by the Vice dean of Education and Students’ affairs, Prof. Dr. Mohamed A. ElBayoumi and coordinated by MSSA volunteers.
Since 2014, MSSA has been serving the training on two levels:
– Curricular: it’s a 4-weeks training at the university hospitals serving about 200
students at the faculty. Last year, we served almost double the time; by splitting the training into two subsequent waves, each for 2 weeks, where students learn both clinical and soft skills at the hospitals taught a specific curriculum by the faculty staff members.
– Extracurricular: it’s a series of once-a-week workshops that discussed medical
research and medical ethics along the last two years. The workshops were conducted by some faculty staff members who conducted those topics effectively at earlier time.
Last year, a research study was conducted during the training, by which we can assess the quality of the training and how far it could meet the needs of the students. The research is currently being analyzed by MSSA research team and the medical education unit. The research aims also at assessing the need of Mansoura medical students to have a preclinical training; to prepare them to the clinical years and overcome the transition mentioned above. The recommendations of this research will be taken into consideration during this year’s training and will be introduced to the faculty; to give them true statistical
data about the current situation of the school.
All this effort contributes to minimizing the need but doesn’t solve it.
So, this year we will be working on two axes, work on proposing a curricular clinical skills training to the faculty council; to minimize the gap students face on turning to the clinical years and to continue with our extracurricular training; as it’s the relevant way we have to meet the students’ need. Also, this training helps students gain more clinical experience and give them a real opportunity to be better future learners and physicians.
References:
(1) Board et al. 1998; a survey of the basic practical skills of final year medical students in one UK medical school.
(2) Sanson-Fisher et al. 2002; trailing a new way to learn clinical skills: systematic clinical appraisal and learning.
(3) Windish et al. 2000; teaching medical students clinical reasoning skills.

(4) Prince et al. 2005; stundets’ opinion about their preparation for clinical practice.
(5) Nasra N. Ayuob et al. 2011; perception of the medical students at king Abdulaziz university of clinical skills module that preparing them for clerkships.

Target groups and beneficiaries:

– 280 3rd and 4th year Mansoura medical students

Objectives and indicators of success:

1: To provide 280 students of the 3rd and 4th year medical students a clinical skills training in 13 clinical departments in Mansoura University by October 2017.
– Number of students participated in the training.
2- To introduce useful extracurricular activities to 150 trainees by October 2017
– Number of attendees.

3- To advocate for better clinical training in Mansoura faculty of medicine.
– Outcome indicator : number of meetings with the medical education unit and faculty administration and corrective decisions
– Impact indicator: better clinical training for undergraduate students

4- To conduct a research study during the phases of the training by 2018.
– Research results presented to the faculty administration.
– Publishing the results in an international journal.

Methodology:

– Calling for the team
– Training preparationss (with the Medical Education Unit and departments)
– Publication for the training
– Call for volunteers
– Selection of the trainees and volunteers
– Orientation day and pre assessment
– Training
– Extracurricular activities
– Follow up meetings and forms
– Post assessment and evaluation
– Reporting and closure meeting with the faculty.

Plans for evaluation:

1- Pre assessment.
Time:At the orientation day.
Value:To assess the previous knowledge and skills of the trainee before the training.

2-Evaluation meeting with Supervisors.
Time: At the end of each training week.
Value: To discuss advantages, disadvantages, problems & how to overcome them.

3- Evaluation sheet for trainees.
Time: At the end of each training week.
Value: To evaluate the Supervisors, doctors and extra-curricular activity and get recommendations.

4- Final Evaluation sheet.
Time: At the end of the training.
Value: To evaluate the supervisors, doctors, extra-curricular activity and the whole training and get recommendations.

5- Workshops evaluation forms
Time: After each workshop.
Value: To evaluate the efficacy of the workshops on the students’ skills and behaviors.

6- Post assessment.
Time:At the end day of the training.
Value:To assess the efficacy of the
training on the trainees.

7- OSCE exam.
Time:At the end of the training.
Value: To assess the skills learnt by the trainees practically.