Review of Faculty Members’ and Medical Students’ Viewpoints about the Reform of General Medical Degree Program, (pre-Clinical Phase) at Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences

Background and Purpose: Educational development center (EDC) at Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences began general medical degree program reform from early 2000 and it was implemented since October 2004 with the admission of the first group of medical students. The study objective is to investigate faculty members and medical students viewpoints on the achievement of the objectives of the reform of general medical degree program at the level of basic sciences. Methods: The study is cross-sectional and its field is Medical Education . Studied population is all faculty members employed to teach and medical students in the fourth and fifth semesters in pre-clinical phase. Sampling method was census and data collection tools were two researcher-made questionnaires. Data analysis was performed using SPSS software. Results: The overall average response to the questionnaire questions was 2.98 for students (n=116, SD=0.646) and for faculty members was 3.36 (n=31; SD=0.551). 84 students (72.4%) and 21 faculty members (67.7%) announced the achievement of the objectives of the program. No correlation is observed between the response of faculty members and students (Spearman s Coefficient=0.1, P=0.873). In student-centered strategies (Spearman s Coefficient=0.975, P=0.005) and electives (Spearman s Coefficient=0.943, P=0.005) there is a correlation between students in the fourth and fifth semesters. Conclusions: Insufficient number of similar previous studies and lack of faculty members willingness to participate in the study make it difficult to generalize the results to other departments. However, as the first study, the results of this study can be effective on future revisions of the program.