Clinical-epidemiological meeting: meaningful learning tool in the internship of Gynecology and Obstetrics

Reunión clínico-epidemiológica: herramienta de aprendizaje significativo en el internado vertical de Ginecología y Obstetricia

Juan Antonio Suárez González^1* https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0262-3108
Mario Gutiérrez Machado¹ https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2695-6660

¹ Villa Clara University of Medical Sciences "Mariana Grajales". Gynecological Hospital Santa Clara. Villa Clara. Cuba.

^*Author for correspondence. E-mail: juansuarezg@infomed.sld.cu

Submitted: 13/02/2020
Accepted: 7/02/2021

Dear editor:

The objective of this letter is to specify the methodology to promote solid and meaningful learning during the clinical-epidemiological meeting held by interns in Gynecology and Obstetrics, in order to unify criteria so that the teacher can develop them with higher quality. Its incorporation into the program is novel and demands to practice the didactic principle of solidity in the assimilation of knowledge; therefore, some aspects have been selected that, in the opinion of these authors, should be considered.

This process supposes a previous contact with the students in order to coordinate it; it begins with direct observation to arrive at the clinical-epidemiological diagnosis of the health situation that is analyzed until the final report is written, which must be debated by the teacher-student group.

Based on the teaching experience and the specialty, we recommend that the clinical-epidemiological meetings methodologically proceed as follows:

• Prior contact for the activity: an essential moment for its organization. In it, the observation guide is implemented, the instrument to be reviewed from the epidemiological point of view is selected and some material is distributed for future evaluation, either observation sheets, pregnant women cards, outpatient and hospital medical records, or other similar documents. In this meeting, the teacher designates roles for the students: if they will carry out the same observation, if groups with the same or different functions will be created, if they will appoint people in charge with different functions -reporters, speakers- or if they will participate uniformly; in addition to other aspects that are considered necessary. ⁽¹⁾
• Introduction: to specify its general objective - to apply the knowledge in the carrying out of clinical-epidemiological diagnoses from certain health situations presented-. Active recall of students' previous knowledge through questions and dialogues. Motivate about the new topic and provoke anticipation. Express in dialogue the way the debate will take place, suggesting dynamic dialogue and specifying that the student should not interrupt, but clarifying that possible biases, conceptual errors or deficiencies found in the group will be defined; in all cases, the professor will be the one who will make partial summaries and will clarify the doubts collectively.
• Development: the students will present the observations of the previously assigned cases and will carry out the clinical-epidemiological analyzes with a view to achieving meaningful learning, which implies the active restructuring of the perceptions, concepts and schemes that the student has in their cognitive structure, and With this conception, it is considered an active agent capable of processing information; and therefore, they should be invited to reason, argue, discuss or explain the most relevant aspects of a matter, topic or problem through heuristic procedures.^(2,3,4) The heuristic conversation is suggested as the most suitable method. The objective of this session is to ask frequent questions in order to consolidate the contents and to arrive at the solidity of knowledge.
• Conclusions: the teacher will make a general summary to reaffirm the main concepts and contents, collective evaluations will be made on what the clinical-epidemiological meeting contributed to them and the best solutions on the problems analyzed will be discussed, based on questions to verify compliance with the proposed objectives. Frequent evaluation of the knowledge will be carried out, quantitatively, without ignoring the qualitative evaluation expressed in the self-evaluation and the co-evaluation, in a reasoned manner and it will be recommended to deepen the study to those students who showed difficulties. Guide the independent study determining the basic and complementary bibliographies in search of information. The teacher will announce the next teaching activity using a resource that creates expectations in the students.

As suggested, the clinical-epidemiological meeting becomes a useful tool in the teaching-learning process of Gynecology and Obstetrics, provided that methodological resources are used in the activities of medical teachers.

BIBLIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES

1. Rodríguez Fernández Z, Rizo Rodríguez RR, Mirabal Fariñas A, García Céspedes ME, Nazario Dolz AM. Modalidades de la discusión diagnóstica como actividad de educación en el trabajo en la enseñanza médica superior. Educ Med Super [Internet]. 2017 [citado 25/03/2020];31(3):[aprox. 16 p.]. Disponible en: http://scielo.sld.cu/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0864-21412017000300020

2. Bravo Díaz A, Rodríguez Barallobre L, Cisneros Depestre AP, Rodríguez Morales O. La preparación pedagógica en las diferentes formas de organización de la enseñanza. Rev Inf Cient [Internet]. 2017 [citado 25/03/2020];96(6):[aprox. 10 p.]. Disponible en: http://www.revinfcientifica.sld.cu/index.php/ric/article/view/1789/3390

3. Díaz Plasencia JA. Bases teóricas del portafolio en la educación médica basada en competencias. Educ Med Super [Internet]. 2016 [citado 25/03/2020];30(1):[aprox. 30 p.]. Disponible en: http://scielo.sld.cu/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0864-21412016000100016

4. Nieva Chávez JA, Martínez Chacón O. Confluencias y rupturas entre el aprendizaje significativo de Ausubel y el aprendizaje desarrollador desde la perspectiva del enfoque histórico cultural de LS Vigotsky. Rev Cubana Edu Superior [Internet]. 2019 [citado 25/03/2020];38(1):[aprox. 14 p.]. Disponible en: http://scielo.sld.cu/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0257-43142019000100009&lng=es&nrm=iso&tlng=es

Declaration of interests

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Contribution of the authors

Juan Antonio Suárez González: analyzed the bibliography and wrote the final draft.
Mario Gutiérrez Machado: carried out the critical review and agreed with the final draft.

This article has been published under the Creative Commons license.