Evaluation of the Virtual Introductory Summer Course in Ophthalmology (VISCO): An accessible and interactive national review course for medical trainees in Ophthalmology

Theme: Medical Education
What: Medical Education
Part of: Medical Student Symposium / Symposium des étudiants en médecine
When: 5/30/2024, 07:30 AM - 11:00 AM
Where: Room | Salle 716 B

Abstract

Purpose: To evaluate the perspectives of participants in an accessible, free, and interactive national virtual review course to support early ophthalmology trainees in grasping fundamental concepts in ophthalmology.

Study Design Survey-based quality improvement study.

Methods In the summer of 2022, a six-week virtual course on Zoom was run by medical students, residents, and ophthalmologists based in Canada. The curriculum was based on learning objectives in ophthalmology set by the Canadian Medical Undergraduate Leads. Surveys were facilitated via Google Forms and contained Likert scale and open-answer questions, assessing confidence and participants’ assessment of the lecturer’s teaching ability, presentation style, and interactivity of the session. Pre- and post-course survey results were analyzed using a two-tailed t-test where a p-value of <0.05 was considered statistically significant.

Results From the 445 participants registered in the 2022 VISCO, the largest group included fourth-year medical students (22.5%) and incoming first-year residents (13.7%). Attendees from all years of medical school and residency training were represented, including family and emergency physicians. A majority (67.9%) of attendees joined from institutions outside of Canada. 236 participants completed the post-session survey.

VISCO was highly rated, with scores for each session ranging, out of 5 (with 5 being the highest score), between 4.56-4.77 for presentation, 4.57-4.88 for teaching ability, and 4.33-4.8 for engagement. The total mean score of all sessions was 4.72. With respect to self-perceived confidence (scores out of 10, with 10 being the highest), the pre-course scores were lowest in approaches to optical coherence tomography (OCT) (3.6/10) and diagnosis and management of basic ocular emergencies (4.92/10). The highest pre-course comfort was reported for concepts of ocular orbital anatomy (7.0/10), basic optics principles (6.36/10) and understanding the role of ophthalmologists (7.3/10). Across all topics, comfort rose significantly following  VISCO attendance (p<0.05).

Participants reported largely positive perceptions of the course and increases in confidence in their ophthalmology knowledge.

Conclusions: VISCO was a well-received virtual interactive course that increased access to ophthalmology education. Particiants' confidence was significantly increased in many fields of ophthalmic knowledge. Virtual interactive courses can be useful in medical education for reducing barriers to knowledge and improving trainee confidence.

 

Presenter(s)

Presenting Author: Cody Lo

Additional Author(s):

Sloane Kowal, Queen's School of Medicine Kingston, Ontario

Deion D'Souza, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa

Andrew Samuel, Max Rady College of Medicine, University of Manitoba

Michael Nguyen, Boston Children’s Hospital/Mass Eye and Ear/Harvard Medical School

Misty Stuti Tanya, Department of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences, McGill University

Anne Xuan-Lan Nguyen, Department of Ophthalmology and Vision Science, University of Toronto

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