AIMS Planning a career in general practice depends on positive attitudes towards primary care. The aim of this study was to compare attitudes of medical students of a Modern Curriculum at Hannover Medical School with those of the Traditional Curriculum before (pre) and after (post) a three-week clerkship in general practice. In parallel, we aimed to analyse several other variables such as age a...

Objectives: The case history is an important part of diagnostic reasoning. The patient management problem method has been used in various studies, but may not reflect the actual reasoning process because a list of choices is given to the subjects in advance. This study investigated the contribution of the history to making the correct diagnosis by using clinical case simulation, in which studen...

The development of critical thinking, the ability to solve problems by assessing evidence using valid inferences, abstractions, and generalizations, is one of the global goals advocated by most medical schools. This study determined changes in critical thinking skills between entry and near the end of the third year of medical school, assessed the predictive ability of a test of critical thinki...

During the preclinical phase of medical school, most students rely on instructor-provided lecture notes and required textbooks, and note taking during lectures. By the time medical students begin their clinical clerkships, they are accustomed to accepting the word of authority at face value. Paradoxically, physicians must be able to critically evaluate and solve patient problems from a rapidly ...

The shortage of medical doctors is now a serious social problem in Japan. There are 2.1 physicians per 1000 residents in Japan, fewer than most other OECD countries. Tokushima Prefecture has the second highest population of medical doctors in Japan, but the shortage of medical doctors in rural areas was observed by an uneven distribution. Primary care practice was started in the education of cl...