4 research outputs found
Students’ perceptions of the instructional quality of district hospital-based training
BACKGROUND : An innovative, three-year training programme, the Bachelor of Clinical Medical
Practice (BCMP), for mid-level medical healthcare workers was started in 2009 by the
Department of Family Medicine, University of Pretoria.
AIM : To measure the students’ perceptions of the instructional quality of district hospitalbased
training.
SETTING : Training of students took place at clinical learning centres in rural district hospitals in
the Mpumalanga and Gauteng provinces.
METHODS : A survey using the MedEd IQ questionnaire was performed in 2010 and 2011 to
measure BCMP second- and third-year students’ perceptions of instructional quality of district
hospital-based training. The MedEd IQ questionnaire is composed of four subscales: preceptor
activities, learning opportunities, learner involvement and the learning environment.
Composite scores of instructional quality were used to present results.
RESULTS : The preceptor activities, learning opportunities and the learning environment were
considered by second- and third-year BCMP students to be of consistently high instructional
quality. In the area of learner involvement, instructional quality increased significantly from
second to third year.
CONCLUSION : Overall, instructional quality of district hospital-based training was high for both
second- and third-year BCMP students, and the instructional quality of learner involvement
being significantly higher in third year students. The MedEd IQ tool was a useful tool for
measuring instructional quality and to inform programme quality improvement.http://www.phcfm.orgam2016Family Medicin
Students' perceptions of the instructional quality of district hospital-based training.
Background: An innovative, three-year training programme, the Bachelor of Clinical Medical Practice (BCMP), for mid-level medical healthcare workers was started in 2009 by the Department of Family Medicine, University of Pretoria.
Aim: To measure the students’ perceptions of the instructional quality of district hospitalbased training. Setting: Training of students took place at clinical learning centres in rural district hospitals in the Mpumalanga and Gauteng provinces.
Methods: A survey using the MedEd IQ questionnaire was performed in 2010 and 2011 to measure BCMP second- and third-year students’ perceptions of instructional quality of district hospital-based training. The MedEd IQ questionnaire is composed of four subscales: preceptor activities, learning opportunities, learner involvement and the learning environment. Composite scores of instructional quality were used to present results.
Results: The preceptor activities, learning opportunities and the learning environment were considered by second- and third-year BCMP students to be of consistently high instructional quality. In the area of learner involvement, instructional quality increased significantly from second to third year.
Conclusion: Overall, instructional quality of district hospital-based training was high for both second- and third-year BCMP students, and the instructional quality of learner involvement being significantly higher in third year students. The MedEd IQ tool was a useful tool for measuring instructional quality and to inform programme quality improvement.
Keywords: clinical associates, evaluation of medical education, mid-level healthcare workers, rural learning centres, rural medical education, student satisfaction
The neutron and its role in cosmology and particle physics
Experiments with cold and ultracold neutrons have reached a level of
precision such that problems far beyond the scale of the present Standard Model
of particle physics become accessible to experimental investigation. Due to the
close links between particle physics and cosmology, these studies also permit a
deep look into the very first instances of our universe. First addressed in
this article, both in theory and experiment, is the problem of baryogenesis ...
The question how baryogenesis could have happened is open to experimental
tests, and it turns out that this problem can be curbed by the very stringent
limits on an electric dipole moment of the neutron, a quantity that also has
deep implications for particle physics. Then we discuss the recent spectacular
observation of neutron quantization in the earth's gravitational field and of
resonance transitions between such gravitational energy states. These
measurements, together with new evaluations of neutron scattering data, set new
constraints on deviations from Newton's gravitational law at the picometer
scale. Such deviations are predicted in modern theories with extra-dimensions
that propose unification of the Planck scale with the scale of the Standard
Model ... Another main topic is the weak-interaction parameters in various
fields of physics and astrophysics that must all be derived from measured
neutron decay data. Up to now, about 10 different neutron decay observables
have been measured, much more than needed in the electroweak Standard Model.
This allows various precise tests for new physics beyond the Standard Model,
competing with or surpassing similar tests at high-energy. The review ends with
a discussion of neutron and nuclear data required in the synthesis of the
elements during the "first three minutes" and later on in stellar
nucleosynthesis.Comment: 91 pages, 30 figures, accepted by Reviews of Modern Physic