The First Attempt at Initiating Problem‐Based Learning as A Method of Teaching–Learning at the University of Medical Sciences in Poznan, Poland

Abstract

The main objective of problem-based learning (PBL) is to provoke students to solve a new problem by themselves. The aim of this study was to investigate whether PBL was a better method of teaching basic and advanced life support to medical students compared with the classical method. The research was undertaken in 2002 in accordance with the European Guidelines 2000 and involved 36 medical students in year 4. The students were divided into two groups: experimental PBL group (17 students) and the control-classical method group (19 students). After the advanced life support course, the students wrote two tests to assess their knowledge on how to open the airway and how to perform basic and advanced resuscitation. The questions contained true or false answers. The students' skills of basic and advanced methods of opening the airway and advanced resuscitation were checked by practical tests. The Mann-Whitney test was used for statistical analysis. The experimental PBL group received significantly better results: 30-45 points (mean, 38.29 points) and 30-47 points (mean, 40.94 points) for the written and practical tests, respectively, compared with the control-classical group (22-34 points [mean, 29.36 points] and 22-35 points [mean, 28.63 points], respectively). Therefore, PBL offers a better method for teaching basic and advanced life support to medical students compared with the classical method.

Students′ satisfaction to hybrid problem-based learning format for basic life support/advanced cardiac life support teaching

“…The results of these studies have found PBL to be better[13141516] or comparable[217] to the traditional lecture-based method in terms of the improvement in the cognitive skills. PBL may not dramatically affect the knowledge scores but may significantly improve the knowledge retention.…”

“…[17] PBL is reported to be a better method of teaching BLS and ACLS to undergraduate medical students than the classical lecture-based method. [15] A previous randomised prospective trial, comparing two methods of teaching BLS/ACLS, i.e., lecture-based multimedia presentation and case-based discussions found that both methods equally improve the level of cognitive skills among medical students. [2] The major limitation with most of the aforementioned studies is a small sample size.…”

Problem-Based Learning Research in Anesthesia Teaching: Current Status and Future Perspective

“…Out of these nine studies, four and five were performed in undergraduate and postgraduate anesthesia teaching, respectively. Amongst the four articles in undergraduate teaching, three assessed the student satisfaction with PBL in comparison to traditional lecture-based method [1, 8, 9], and one assessed the educational objectives accomplished with PBL [10]. The relevant clinical studies in postgraduate teaching compared PBL with traditional lecture-based method only in specific topics in anesthesiology like ethical aspects [11], preanesthetic assessment [12], intensive care [13], and continued medical education on air embolism [14].…”

“…Grzeskowiak et al [8] concluded that PBL is a better method of teaching basic life support (BLS) and advanced cardiac life support (ACLS) to undergraduate medical students than the classical lecture-based method. The assessment method used was multiple-choice question and clinical skill testing before and after the session.…”

“…Very recently, Miclescue, in a review, discussed the PG anesthesia teaching curriculum in their medical university and concluded that case-based discussion is a popular, reliable, and satisfactory learning procedure despite its practical limitation regarding the selection of appropriate cases [18]. However, Grzeskowiak et al could not demonstrate any advantage of case-based method over the traditional lecture method when used for teaching BLS algorithm to undergraduate students [8] as well as in continuing medical education on air embolism [14]. The effectiveness of case-based discussion and lecture-based method has been reported to be similar in terms of improving participants' immediate acquisition of knowledge, capacity of applying knowledge to solve problems, information management, clinical reasoning, or linking basic and clinical knowledge.…”