Efficacy of Medical Student Surgery Journal Club

Abstract

Background: Journal clubs exist in a variety of forms in medical schools across the United States. Many incorporate a full spectrum of medical specialties, some are specific to certain interest groups or specialties, and many widely vary in whether or not they are school mandated or student-run. While these clubs are ubiquitously scattered throughout medical education, there has been very little quantitative or qualitative analysis regarding the efficacy of these clubs in enhancing medical students' abilities to evaluate clinical literature. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of attending Surgical Journal Club meetings at Eastern Virginia Medical School from both a qualitative and quantitative perspective. The authors' hypothesis was that regular attendance of these sessions would improve student performance from a multitude of perspectives and demonstrate the value of clinical literature analysis earlier in medical education.

Methods: A fifteen question Likert survey was administered on an optional basis to thirty-six medical students attending journal club. Responses were analyzed anonymously, and there was no incentive or demerit for completing the survey. Data was compiled and the mean, median, and mode for each question calculated with "5" corresponding to "Strongly Agree" and "1" corresponding to "Strongly Disagree."

Results: Twenty-seven of thirty-six attendees to our seventh journal club meeting completed the survey. Student responses were overwhelming positive, with all but one question reaching above "Agree" by analysis of the mean responses.

Conclusion: Journal clubs remain an integral part of medical education but their importance has been diminished in recent years due to the increasing demands of other aspects of the first two years in medical school. We described a medical student run/established journal club that increased students' interest in surgery, their perceived knowledge-base, and comfort in critically analyzing medical journal articles.

Keywords: Interpersonal and Communication Skills; Medical Knowledge; Practice-Based Learning and Improvement; club; education; journal; literature; subspecialty; surgery.