Xu Chun, Li Yiping, Chen Pingsheng, Pan Min, Bu Xiaodong
Department of Pathology and Pathophysiology, School of Medicine, Southeast University, Nanjing, 210009, China.
BMC Med Educ. 2020 Aug 8;20(1):259. doi: 10.1186/s12909-020-02167-5.
Pathology education provides information on pathology and guides students to become pathologists. Recently, the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China required the establishment of the system of 'High-quality Online and Offline Courses', which indicates that online courses will play an important role in higher education. Furthermore, the number of pathologists currently cannot satisfy clinical needs. To solve this health issue and implement the policy from the Ministry of Education, it is necessary to improve the current state of pathology education. First, we need to know students' opinions of the current courses and their professional choices.
Online questionnaires covering the quality of traditional courses, attitudes towards online courses, and suggestions for optimizing courses were designed and applied. Whether students want to become pathologists and the underlying reasons for this interest are also included in this survey. Participants are medical students from certain colleges in Nanjing. The collected data were assessed by statistical analyses, and p-values less than 0.05 were considered significant.
Of the 342 valid responses, 60.94% of undergraduate students showed their interest in pathology courses, and among them, 48.72% expressed that they may become pathologists. However, the corresponding percentage is only 29.59% in the group without interest. To optimize curricula, the top two suggestions are introducing more clinical cases (undergraduate students, 64.45%; graduate students, 79.09%) and making the classes lively and interesting (undergraduate students, 59.77%; graduate students, 62.79%). Approximately 80.00% of students consider online courses to be good supplementary materials to traditional courses, and approximately half prefer an online-offline mixed learning model. Salary, interest, and employment status are the main factors influencing students' professional choices.
Students are generally satisfied with traditional pathology courses, and online courses are good supplementary materials in their opinions. It has been suggested that clinical cases be introduced in classes. It is more likely that students who have an interest in pathology will become pathologists. The data from this survey also show that the main causes of the shortage of pathologists are a lack of engaging work and an unsatisfactory salary.
病理学教育提供病理学相关信息，并引导学生成为病理学家。最近，中华人民共和国教育部要求建立“线上线下精品课程”体系，这表明在线课程将在高等教育中发挥重要作用。此外，目前病理学家的数量无法满足临床需求。为了解决这一健康问题并落实教育部的政策，有必要改善病理学教育的现状。首先，我们需要了解学生对当前课程的看法以及他们的专业选择。
设计并应用了涵盖传统课程质量、对在线课程的态度以及优化课程建议的在线问卷。本次调查还包括学生是否想成为病理学家以及产生这种兴趣的潜在原因。参与者为南京某些高校的医学生。对收集到的数据进行统计分析评估，p值小于0.05被认为具有统计学意义。
在342份有效回复中，60.94%的本科生对病理学课程表现出兴趣，其中48.72%表示可能会成为病理学家。然而，在无兴趣组中，这一比例仅为29.59%。为优化课程，排在前两位的建议是引入更多临床病例（本科生为64.45%；研究生为79.09%）以及使课堂生动有趣（本科生为59.77%；研究生为62.79%）。约80.00%的学生认为在线课程是传统课程的良好补充材料，约一半的学生更喜欢线上线下混合学习模式。薪资、兴趣和就业状况是影响学生专业选择的主要因素。
学生总体上对传统病理学课程满意，并且他们认为在线课程是良好的补充材料。建议在课堂上引入临床病例。对病理学有兴趣的学生更有可能成为病理学家。本次调查数据还表明，病理学家短缺的主要原因是工作缺乏吸引力和薪资不尽人意。
