features of medical student's theses at kermanshah university of medical sciences during a five-year period

introduction:most of the studies conducted iniranian medical schools are carried out as student's theses on which a lot of time and energy is spent. the purposeof the present study was to determine the characteristics of medical student'stheses at kermanshah university of medical sciences during a five year period(2004-2008).methods:in this descriptive,cross-sectional study a checklist consisting of 21 questions was designed. thedata were gathered from all medical student's theses during 2004-2008 (n=189)using a consensus method of data collection. data were analyzed by descriptivestatistics using spss software.results: in terms of type,most of the theses were descriptive cross-sectional (33.3%), descriptive(29.1%), and descriptive-analytical (18.5%). the highest numberof theses belonged to clinical psychiatry (18.5%) and obstetrics andgynecology (17.5%) departments. other departments, especially basic sciencedepartments had the lowest number of theses becauseclinical teachers constituted 86.2% of the supervisors. the duration of thethesis completion was between 2 and 24 months. using hospital records andinpatients files were the methods mostly used for data collection and as datasources. furthermore, we could not find an appropriateassessment and scoring system of theses in place.conclusion:medical student's theses lacked appropriate quality therefore this issue should be seriouslytaken into consideration by educational managers.