How Much Is Too Much Reading for Medical Students? Assigned Reading and Reading Rates at One Medical School

Abstract

Medical students require significant time to complete assigned reading just once at the reading rates required to comprehend the cognitively challenging material. Before assigning reading, faculty should consider the amount that could reasonably be accomplished by their students.

Informatics competencies for healthcare professionals: the Technology Informatics Guiding Education Reform (TIGER) Initiative model

“…During the course of an interview, Manoj Saxena, general manager of IBM Watson Solutions, stated that the body of medical knowledge now doubles every 5 years (1) . In a 2010 survey at one medical school, Klatt and Klatt calculated that it would require 28 -41 h per week for students to complete assigned readings once (2) . This example helps to illustrate the issue of information overload, which may lead students and practicing professionals to turn to the easiest-to-find, rather than the highest quality, information available (3) .…”

Professional Interactions: Negotiation and Expression for Future Physicians and Healthcare Providers

“…Medical students are generally spread thin with regard to their coursework and extracurricular commitments [24], and the importance of board exam scores for residency match applications, understandably, exerts pressure on students to focus on learning topics directly "relevant" to career advancement. Given this, course staff discretion regarding when to deliver certain lectures is crucial for effective implementation and fulfillment of educational objectives.…”

Functional and structural impact of the loss of the leucine-rich repeat protein LRIT1 in the mouse retina.

“…Data examining this hypothesis demonstrate that GABA-dependent feedback is slow compared to ephaptic and pH-mediated feedback (45,46). The GABA hypothesis has been shown to modulate horizontal cell feedback in newts (37) and salamanders (47) but exhibits no consistent effects in the macaque retina (48).…”

“…These findings suggest that online learning may limit social interaction and the student's ability to determine how much they learned (9). They also suggest that educators must design online learning with the student's time allocation in mind (45,46). This may require educators to know their audience's initial knowledge level to consider the difference between a novice and an expert learner because a novice learner will take more time to learn new material (45).…”

“…Simplifying an online learning module by cutting down the amount of and carefully choosing text, accompanying figures, and assessment questions reduces cognitive load and reading time to ease learning while requiring less time (18,45,59). …”