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Background.The system-based curriculum of the Medical College of Alzaiem Alazhari University, Sudan, entails skills training for pre-clerkship students. The increased demands on full-time trained clinical teachers cannot be solved by employing part-time staff owing to the poor financial incentives that are offered. Objectives. To verify the feasibility of implementing a peer tutor model for skills training of junior students and to establish whether this model can overcome the shortage of clinical teachers. Methods. Eight selected and trained peer tutors participated in teaching certain aspects related to the basic skills module to 2nd-year students (N=144). Three sessions were prepared, conducted and implemented by peer tutors. The effectiveness of the experience was evaluated by an objective structured clinical examination (OSCE) and two questionnaires. Results. Junior students received the peer teaching sessions favourably and requested a continuation of the process. The performance of the tutees was good. Peer tutors enjoyed and benefited from this teaching method without it negatively affecting their own learning. Discussion. Our study demonstrated that a peer teaching educational model is feasible and can contribute to solving the problem of skills training of junior medical students. The peer teaching model is effective, provided the tutors are well trained and the educational experience is supervised. Conclusion. Peer-assisted learning is effective and beneficial for both tutors and tutees in resource-limited environments. It can contribute towards addressing the problem of skills training of junior medical students where there is a shortage of trained clinical teachers.

Introduction: Career selection and decision to pursue a medical career is a multi factorial process. It is influenced by the personal capabilities and the available resources as well as the social, educational, economical and cultural factors. Sudan is one of the African countries with a high number of medical colleges and an increasing number of Sudanese students are joining the medical colleges each year. Aim and objectives: The aims of the present study were to study and compare the motives and reasons for joining a medical college and pursuing a medical career, among the newly admitted Sudanese medical students. Methods: A cross sectional survey was implemented, in eight medical colleges (four private and four public colleges) in Khartoum. A semi structured questionnaire was used to collect data from the subjects to investigate and compare the reasons and motives for choosing a medical career. Results: 1556 students responded to the questionnaire (86%). 50.9% of them were admitted on private account; and 63.7% students were from public colleges; and 61.8% were female. The highest ranked reason for choosing a medical career was the altruistic reason (78.1%) and the lowest reason was the personal ambition (17.9%). 71.2% of the students were influenced by the family to joining a medical college. 11.9% of the students joined the medical colleges against their desire. There were differences between the publicly admitted and privately admitted students. Discussion: The reasons and motives of the Sudanese medical students, for selecting a medical career, are comparable to other international studies.

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