Decision making on antimicrobial use: Cat and dog owners' knowledge and preferences for veterinary communication.

BACKGROUND: Veterinarians' understanding of cat and dog owners' perceptions about antimicrobial use will enhance their ability to communicate with clients to uphold antimicrobial stewardship guidelines. METHODS: A total of 571 cat and dog owners were surveyed via an online platform to understand their antimicrobial knowledge and preferences for veterinary communication in antimicrobial use decision making. Data were analysed descriptively and inferentially to determine relationships between variables. RESULTS: Cat and dog owners' backgrounds had an impact their antimicrobial knowledge. Women, individuals with a university degree, those with a health/science background and those identifying as white had a higher level of knowledge of antibiotics and antibiotic resistance. Owners' trust in veterinarians positively impacts adherence to recommendations. Where there was a strong preference for one type of messaging regarding antimicrobial use and stewardship, the owner's background was not predictive of a difference in response. LIMITATIONS: The study population was mostly white, which reflects the US population and the reported distribution of pet owners who own dogs and cats. Respondents may have been susceptible to recall bias and/or social desirability bias. CONCLUSION: Veterinarians should tailor their communication to meet clients' level of knowledge and rely on competent communication to enhance understanding and facilitate adherence to antimicrobial stewardship guidelines.

Assessment of Safety Culture at a Veterinary Teaching Hospital in the United States.

This study assessed the fidelity of an existing questionnaire regarding attitudes toward safety culture in an academic veterinary hospital setting and gathered baseline data on these attitudes in a local population. A cross-sectional study design was used to evaluate perceptions held by veterinary teaching hospital employees. An established veterinary safety culture survey was modified and administered as a confidential online survey to faculty, house officers, and professional staff of a veterinary teaching hospital in the United States. Confirmatory and exploratory factor analysis were conducted to compare the adapted survey to the established version. Descriptive statistics were used to characterize baseline safety culture. The adapted survey exhibited factor groupings that were mostly in agreement with, but slightly different from, the original instrument. In general, survey respondents outlined positive attitudes toward the various domains of safety culture, though we identified opportunities for improvement in some areas. An adapted veterinary safety culture survey can be applied to a veterinary teaching hospital in the United States to assess baseline data surrounding the culture of safety and to identify opportunities for focused improvement efforts.

Exploring Shyness among Veterinary Medical Students: Implications for Mental and Social Wellness.

BACKGROUND: Shyness is defined as "the tendency to feel awkward, worried or tense during social encounters, especially with unfamiliar people." While shyness is not necessarily a social disorder, extreme cases of shyness may classify as a social phobia and require medical treatment. Extant research has noted shyness may be correlated with social problems that could be detrimental to one's health, career, and social relationships. This exploratory study examined the prevalence, source, and nature of shyness among incoming Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) program students at one veterinary medical school. METHODS: One hundred first-year DVM program students were administered a modified version of the Survey on Shyness. RESULTS: Results indicate most students (85%) self-identified as at least a little shy, a figure that is believed to be significantly higher than national population norms in the United States. Students attributed the primary source of shyness to personal fears and insecurities. Students reported frequent feelings of shyness and generally perceived shyness as an undesirable quality. Students reported that strangers, acquaintances, authority figures, and classmates often make them feel shy. CONCLUSIONS: Given the high prevalence of self-reported shyness among veterinary medical students, institutions may wish to include strategies to address shyness as part of a comprehensive wellness program.

Think Subscores Are a Helpful Form of Feedback? Think Again.

Many educators believe subscores offer an easy approach for (1) discerning what students know/can do, and (2) providing more analytical feedback to students. In addition, many educators use subscores as a tool for guiding targeted remediation in specific areas of study. Unfortunately, there are several significant problems associated with subscores, and such beliefs and practices may be problematic and ill-advised. The purpose of this article is to address some of the problems relating to subscores in classroom assessment scenarios and to encourage educators to be cautious of these often deceptive and problematic measures.

Exploring Aberrant Responses Using Person Fit and Person Response Functions.

Person fit statistics provide equivocal interpretations regarding aberrant responses. This study uses person response functions (PRF) to supplement the interpretation of person fit statistics. Sixty-three multiple-choice items were administered to a sample of persons (N=31) who used guessing strategies to answer them. After answering each item, participants indicated which guessing strategy they used. The data were analyzed with a Rasch (1960) model, where the item calibrations were anchored to values obtained when the items were appropriately administered. The participants showed poor model-data fit as expected. Further examination of person misfit using person response functions suggests that PRF can provide information about absolute person fit to a model, whereas fit statistics provide information about relative fit, given the other persons in the testing group. PRF can also provide information about where and how person responses misfit the model. This additional information can assist practitioners in using and interpreting individual scores appropriately.

Students' Perceptions of and Experiences With Educational Technology: A Survey.

BACKGROUND: It is generally assumed that incoming students in medical education programs will be better equipped for the "digital age" given their younger age and an educational upbringing in which technology was seemingly omnipresent. In particular, many assume that today's medical students are more likely to hold positive attitudes and increased comfortability with technology and possess greater information technology (IT) skills. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to compare responses of incoming veterinary medical students to a series of IT-related questions contained in a common questionnaire over the course of a 10-year period (2005-2015) to discern whether students' attitudes have improved and uses and comfortability with technology have increased as anticipated. METHODS: A survey measuring attitudes and preferences, computing experience, and technology ownership was administered each year for the past 10 years to incoming veterinary medical students at a large veterinary school in the United States. Students' responses to survey items were compared at 3 data points (2005, 2010, and 2015). RESULTS: Today's incoming veterinary medical students tend to indicate the same desire to improve skills using spreadsheets and web page design as incoming students from 10 years ago. It seems that despite technological advances and increased exposure to such applications and skills, there remains a challenge for students to "keep up" with the ever evolving technology. Moreover, although students continue to report they are very comfortable with using a computer (and related devices), many use their computers as typewriters or word processors, as opposed to a means for performing more advanced computing functions. CONCLUSIONS: In general, today's medical students are not expert computer users as many assume. Despite an upbringing in a digitized world, many students still lack many basic computing skills.

Creating a multi-institutional family medicine clerkship examination: lessons learned.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Multiple choice examinations assess learners' attainment of medical knowledge. Developing multiple choice examinations that discriminate among learners is difficult and time-consuming. Many institutions avoid this effort by using the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) subject examinations, which can also provide comparisons to a national norm. The family medicine subject examination has been criticized, however, because the test's content does not reflect the learning expected during the clerkship. Additionally, the test results cannot guide clerkship directors sufficiently to help students study or to improve the curriculum. METHODS: Family medicine clerkships at three different institutions used a common 75-item examination based on the textbook Essentials of Family Medicine, Fifth Edition, for one academic year. Data were pooled and analyzed. The Raush Item Response Theory assessed student and item performance. RESULTS: A total of 451 students took the examination. Across the three schools: (1) item separations (Rasch) were high (8.64), indicating good spread in item difficulty, (2) person separations were lower (1.65), indicating that medical students are likely a relatively homogeneous group, (3) Rasch item reliabilities were strong (ranging from .96-.99), and (4) Rasch person reliabilities (.54-.73) were lower. True internal consistencies across items as measured by the Kuder-Richardson 20 (KR-20) reliabilities were just adequate at .71-.77. CONCLUSIONS: By pooling resources, clerkship directors can share the creation and implementation of a written examination that has acceptable reliability and greater face validity than the NBME subject examination. They also have more control over examination content and can guide students' learning and curriculum improvements more accurately.