Videotapes for teaching clinical methods: Medical students' response to a pilot project

Abstract

Videotapes on clinical methods can be used to provide students with ‘personal’ instruction by specialist, expert teachers. However, the effectiveness of videotapes in communicating clinical methods and skills depends largely on the interest they generate in students. To assess student response to videotape teaching of clinical skills, we prepared 10 videotapes on history-taking and physical examination and displayed these in the College of Medicine library alongside books on relevant subjects. No particular publicity was used or efforts made to persuade students to use them. Students' response was assessed by means of questionnaires completed anonymously. Over a period of 9 months the tapes were viewed on 130 occasions; the most populartapes were on complete systematic examination, on cardiovascular examination and history-taking, which together were viewed by 46 per cent of the respondents. On acquisition of clinical methods, 84 per cent thought they gained new knowledge on practical steps, 42 per cent said that they gained new thoughts and 24 per cent thought that they learned new techniques on clinical methods. 28 per cent stated that they would like the tapes to be more comprehensive and to include more abnormal signs. The results show that students view videotapes with interest and well-made tapes can be used to supplement bedside learning.