AUDITORIUM PRESENTATION Pending

PANEL on CASES

The Development of an Interactive Case Template for Medical Teaching and Learning: A Pan Canadian Initiative

Nancy Posel and David Fleiszer

McGill University, Montreal, Canada

ABSTRACT:

This presentation will review the newly completed interactive case template, developed at the Faculty of Medicine at McGill University, in conjunction with the medical faculties at the University of British Columbia, McMaster University and the University of Ottawa.

The development of one template or case construct for four schools with different theoretical, philosophical and pedagogical approaches to the teaching and learning of medicine, and the inclusion of schools that are geographically distant, has allowed the project participants to address communication and network challenges and ensured the viability and practicability of the template, irrespective of teaching rationales.

Medical educators use cases (in a multitude of formats) to stimulate group discussion, synthesize and integrate acquired knowledge, and permit students to practice in a simulated but valid setting. On-line cases are often developed by individual schools or educators/practitioners and made available either via the Internet or on CD ROMS. This practice provides students with a wide, if fragmented, variety of cases, but often mandates the re-creation of the case structure, repeated and redundant development or programming, as well as creation of new multimedia every time.

The current project facilitates the creation of cases based on the medical model, beginning with a chief complaint and moving through patient history, review of systems, physical exam, laboratory and radiology testing and treatments. The student’s objective is to define and prioritize a differential diagnosis. In addition, the student is able to review and compare his or her course and decision making strategy during the case with that of an expert.

The process, which includes a patient interview associated with rationales, as well as multimedia representations of physical findings, test results and procedures, allows the student to move through a virtual clinic or inpatient hospital area and attempts to replicate a real life encounter as closely as possible.

The cases are highly interactive, and include: a) discussion, response and feedback; or b) question, answer and rationale; as well as integrating high quality images, audio, video, electronic layered transparencies and interactive animations.

The actual construct has two components: a) an easy to use authoring tool that allows medical educators to author Internet based cases via an object oriented and reusable template, linked to a digital repository of clinical images; and b) an imaginative student interface. Both the case authoring tool and the student interface are accessible through the National Medical Digital Repository. Each new case enriches the repository and the multimedia available to future authors and expands the breadth and potential of the template. Further, the straightforward integration of multimedia objects located in the cases and thus within the repository, ensures re-use and repurposing of these valuable objects. This process is additionally supported by the collection of the questions, answers and rationales included in each case and gathered into a question databank within the repository.

Uncomplicated access to a shared learning object repository permits easy accessibility in multiple learner workplaces of the on-line interactive medical cases, and enhances the potential for the growth of cases and associated multimedia within a central location or portal.

Evaluation by new authors and medical students to date has demonstrated that the cases are relatively easy to create and well received by students, who particularly enjoy access to multimedia.

This Canadian endeavor will: a) encourage authors (faculty/teachers) without programming expertise to create their own cases, enriching their individual electronic curricula while learning new technologies; b) promote partnerships, sharing of media, and enhance and increase the databank of both cases and multimedia within the National Medical Digital Repository to be used at local, regional and remote levels and c) support self-paced and life-long learning.

The authors feel that case construction will expand beyond medical students to include broader implications for the educational community as a whole, encompassing post-graduate medical learning, distance education, ancillary healthcare teaching, and, in a different format, patient education.

BENEFIT TO PARTICIPANTS ATTENDING SESSION:

This presentation and/or demonstration will allow participants to review a collaborative effort to develop re-usable interactive case-based modules. Benefits will include: a) review of a template that suits a variety of teaching styles and philosophies; b) encouragement of a recognition of the role and significance of digital repositories in the development, accessibility and re-use of material, thus creating a more effective and efficient process; and c) promotion of the potential of this Canadian initiative to move beyond national to international use.

Nancy Posel

The McGill Molson Medical Informatics Project The Lady Meredith House

McGill University, Faculty of Medicine

1110 Pine avenue west, Suite 18

Montreal, Quebec, Canada

H3A 1A3

Phone: 514 398 2077

Fax: 514 398 1753

mailto:nancy.posel@mcgill.ca

Website: http://curriculum.mmi.mcgill.ca/

CO-AUTHORS:

David Fleiszer