The use of student narratives as research substrates

Abstract

Supervising medical students to develop a research project can be challenging. Unless a student has prior experience in research, they may struggle to identify a research question that can be addressed by a novice researcher in a time-limited project. At the same time, when a project spans years of the degree, a student who has been offered an "off-the-shelf" idea may lose interest in the project and the assignment can become burdensome. We describe how a cohort of medical students were encouraged to focus their project ideas on a story of someone whose medical problem was of interest to them. Most students opted to conduct a literature review based on their "story". Here we present their stories and describe how they were led to this point in the process. DESIGN INSIGHTand impaired vision. She has had no time lately to attend her own GP appointments. As a result, her health is also declining. Research Question:While there is significant research on carer burden of those supporting people living with dementia, this is not the case for culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) carers. What is the impact on the health of older carers of a CALD person living with dementia? MichaelWho: Michael is a 23-year-old in his final year of his undergraduate degree at university. He is a healthy and active young man, having grown up playing rugby, basketball, and touch football. He is a very sociable character and loves his lifestyle.What: Michael has no significant past medical history and rarely needed to visit his GP. But over a couple of weeks, Michael started to feel generally unwell, fatigued, and nauseous. He ignored these vague non-specific symptoms attributing them to being run down from university, which in the past had amounted to nothing and abated within a few days. A few months later, he noticed a small painless lump in his left testicle. Michael being the eldest child of three, felt too awkward about talking to younger family members for advice, so instead he left it for a few more weeks in the hope that it would spontaneously resolve. When the lump did not go away, Michael had to accept that something might be wrong and made an active decision to book an appointment with a GP. Aspect of Care:At the first consultation Michael was told that "it was all fine and nothing to worry about". But this did little to clear Michael's mind and he left with a sinking feeling that something was simply "not right". After battling with these feelings for a few weeks he decided to alert his family into what has been happening and he was again booked into see a GP. This time, the GP suspected it was a varicocele and wrote up a non-urgent referral to a urologist. The next available appointment was in three months. The urologist sent him off for a scrotal ultrasound. Again, the next available scan was a few days later. Upon review of the ultrasound, the urologist diagnosed Michael with testicular cancer and urgently referred him onto the oncologist. It was December 23 of that year when he was finally diagnosed. Michael went in f...