Getting to the core of medicine: Developing undergraduate forensic medicine and pathology teaching

An evaluation of Italian medical students attitudes and knowledge regarding forensic medicine

INTRODUCTION

This study aims to assess students' knowledge of forensic medicine concepts and their opinions regarding the course taught during the degree course in Medicine and Surgery in an Italian university. Consequently, the study aims to assess the impact of the course on the students' knowledge and attitude in choosing a medical residency.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

A cross-sectional study was conducted through an anonymous web-based survey of medical students at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore. Descriptive and univariate analysis were conducted.

RESULTS

1166 students completed the survey. The forensic medicine course appears to be extremely important in providing training in the fundamental concepts of forensic medicine, especially professional liability, defensive medicine, and forensic pathology. Attending autopsies is important during the course, and their number should be more than ten. Additionally, univariate analysis demonstrates that students' awareness of forensic medicine topics, such as the function of the forensic physicians, professional liability, and defensive medicine, improves in the fifth or sixth year of the course. After the course, more students would choose to pursue a nonclinical and nonsurgical specialty, and forensic medicine specifically, for their residency.

CONCLUSIONS

The forensic medicine course has the task of defining the duties and responsibilities of forensic physicians, providing indispensable tools for future medical practitioners, regardless of their future specialisation, and limiting the increasing use of defensive medicine. In conclusion, we recommend further multicenter studies to evaluate the role and direct effect of undergraduate forensic medicine courses on students and on the quality of practice.

Online teaching of forensic medicine and pathology during the COVID-19 pandemic: A course evaluation

As the COVID-19 pandemic progressed in early 2020, social distancing rules and ‘lockdowns’ brought face-to-face teaching in universities in the UK, and globally, to a halt, leading to an abrupt move to online teaching and learning.

This article details student feedback to a course on applied forensic medicine and pathology – framed as ‘safeguarding vulnerable patients’ – which was adapted for delivery online in response to restrictions imposed by the pandemic.

That feedback indicated that the adapted online course was well-received and, overall, it compared favourably with pervious iterations of the blended learning course, which had included a substantial face-to-face teaching component. Students remained engaged with the teaching, and they continued to see the relevance of forensic medicine to their future clinical practice.

Using simulation mannequins and actors in training for external post-mortem examinations -experiences from use in medical students and police officers

In the daily practice of external post-mortem examinations and dealing with surviving dependents, striking failures can be observed regularly, pointing to an increased demand for training of the various professional groups involved. In this study, the experience gained from using simulation mannequins and actors for post-mortem examination training in medical students and police officers are presented. Since 2017, a training station has been offered at the Medical Faculty of the Technical University of Dresden (Germany) for practicing examinations in death scene and establishing communication with grieving relatives. It is conducted in small groups of up to 5 people, both for medical students and for police officers and police recruits. These courses are evaluated by means of questionnaires including 3 and 11 items respectively for the different groups. The questionnaires have been completed by 679 medical students and 67 police participants. Both groups of participants evaluated their previous experience as average. They assessed the course as having a high degree of practical and professional relevance. The didactic transfer of the teaching contents and its competent support were rated remarkably positive by the participants. Additionally, the police group reported high rates of approval for the use of feedback, the learning effect, and the appropriateness of the group size. The establishment and continuation of the simulation-based external post-mortem examination in the form of small-group teaching is associated with a considerable expenditure of equipment, material and personnel. In addition, its implementation requires sound cooperation structures. On the other hand, introduction and continuation of these types of additional teaching and learning methods, with a large practical component, can increase confidence in daily practice, and thus improve the quality of external post-mortem examination. Ultimately, this can also improve the cooperation between forensic medicine and the investigating authorities.

A challenge based learning experience in forensic medicine

Learning about forensic sciences is a crucial part of the formation of professionals working in medicine and health areas; this includes a range of coverage from legal-medical cases to forensic autopsies. However, knowledge of forensics by medical students is limited, because the teaching focus has been on the fundamentals of procedures in this field. To develop the necessary skills, specific support, and targeted learning tasks should be designed to enable the integration of interdisciplinary work in processes, infrastructure, and equipment used in a high-quality-forensic investigation. The innovative educational experience of the Crime Scene Investigation CSI Lab was a week-long activity using the pedagogical strategy of Challenge-Based Learning. It addresses the problem that students need training in an authentic setting. The intervention, in September 2017, included 33 students from different disciplines such as medicine, law, and marketing. They participated in various learning settings in multidisciplinary teams and were challenged by experts from the State Institute for Forensic Sciences to analyze specific processes. The outcomes of the CSI Lab implementations provided evidence of how the students benefited from the experience. The results showed that 80% of the teams had an excellent approach to the solution, justification of the proposal and feasibility assessment. However, only 60% achieved a solution that met the requirements. The educational process was assessed by their perceptions of the educational strategy of the CSI Lab experience. The results indicated that 88.9% of the students believed that the experience broadened their perspectives on forensic sciences. 73.1% thought that the design of the activities, visits, and plenaries added value to their academic training, and 88.9% found it to be interesting. Regarding whether or not the activities helped the participants to understand and perform a legal-medicine investigation, 92.6% believed that it did help them recognize and understand the interventional areas and processes necessary for the investigation. CONCLUSION: Students demonstrated high acceptance of the context-rich design of the practical activities and educational experiences that were grounded in active learning. The effect on curriculum design is that the interactions and interdisciplinarity of the programs must be assessed, as these experiences could motivate them to engage in solving the social challenges of the 21st century.