Kmf. Itani et al., IMPACT OF A PROBLEM-BASED LEARNING CONFERENCE ON SURGERY RESIDENTS IN-TRAINING EXAM (ABSITE) SCORES, The Journal of surgical research, 70(1), 1997, pp. 66-68
The impact of problem-based learning on surgery residents' education i
s unknown. In this study we measured the impact of a weekly structured
problem-based learning conference on surgery residents' ABSITE scores
and compared it to traditional clinical conferences and self-studying
. A questionnaire was designed to determine the perceived quality of t
he basic (PQC(B)), and the clinical (PQC(C)) conferences as well as se
lf-studying (PQC(S)). The Pearson correlation between P&C-B, PQC(C), P
QC(S), and attendance at the basic science conference and each of the
ABSITE total score (ABSITE), basic science (BS) and clinical science (
CS) component scores were calculated. PQC(S) (4.2) was significantly h
igher than PQC(B) (2.9) and PQC(C) (2.5) (P = 0.0002). PQC(S) and PQC(
B) correlated highly with each of ABSITE, CS, and BS while PQC(C) did
not show any correlation. A high correlation was also observed between
attendance at basic science and each of ABSITE, CS, and BS but narrow
ly missed significance. It was also observed that BS scores highly cor
related to the CS scores at all postgraduate levels (P = 0.0001). We c
onclude that performance on all components of the ABSITE is mostly dep
endent on individual residents. This individual factor is boosted by s
elf-studying which can be motivated by instituting a problem-based lea
rning technique within the program. Traditional conferences even if po
pular among residents have no impact on measurement tests. (C) 1997 Ac
ademic Press.