ABSTRACT
Background: Students reported positive learning outcomes during a simulation study addressing compliance and speaking up. Purpose: Investigate if the impacts of the simulation had a lasting effect on participants after moving into practice. Method: Semi-structured interviews focusing on memory of the study, psychological impacts, educational impacts, professional impacts, and experiences in practice were conducted with Advanced Care Paramedics (3) and Respiratory Therapists (7) between 19 and 24 months after the original study. Discussion: Participants indicated the simulation helped them develop the skill and confidence to speak up, preparing them to speak up in practice. Primary findings included: (i) the importance of experience for speaking up, (ii) the benefit of high-impact simulation, and (iii) the importance of simulation training. Conclusions: Simulation for speaking up should occur early. Conducting high-impact simulations for speaking up is a practical and actionable intervention that appears to enhance confidence, ability, and likelihood of speaking up in practice.
ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: To conduct a study of the validity of the new Medical College Admission Test (MCAT). METHOD: Deidentified data for first- and second-year medical students (185 women, 54.3%; 156 men, 45.7%) who matriculated in 2016 and 2017 to the University of Minnesota Medical School-Twin Cities were included. Of those students, 220 (64.5%) had taken the new MCAT exam and 182 (53.4%) had taken the old MCAT exam (61 [17.9%] had taken both). The authors calculated descriptive statistics and Pearson product moment correlations (r) between new and old MCAT section scores. They conducteda regression analysis of MCAT section scores with Step 1 scores and with preclerkship course performance. They also conducted an exploratory factor analysis (principal component analysis with varimax rotation) of MCAT scores, undergraduate grade point average, Step 1 scores, and course performance. RESULTS: The new MCAT exam section mean score percentiles ranged from 72 to 78 (mean composite score percentile of 80). The old MCAT exam section mean score percentiles ranged from 84 to 88 (mean composite score percentile of 83). The pattern of correlations among and between new and old MCAT exam section scores (range of r: 0.03-0.67; P < .01) provided evidence of both divergent and convergent validities. Backward multiple regression of new MCAT exam section scores and Step 1 scores resulted in a multiple R of .440; the same analysis with Human Behavior course performance as the dependent variable provided a similar solution with the expected sections of the new MCAT exam (multiple R = .502). The factor analysis resulted in 4 cohesive, theoretically meaningful factors: biomedical knowledge, basic science concepts, cognitive reasoning, and general achievement. CONCLUSIONS: This study provided empirical evidence of multiple types of validity for the new MCAT exam.
