The Effect of Distance Education Conducted during the COVID-19 Pandemic Period on the Psychomotor Skill Development of a Dental School Students.

Purpose: This study compared the development of face-to-face (F2F) psychomotor skills vs. a modified online dental anatomy course during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: The 9-HPT is regularly applied for the students' psychomotor skill assessment in the Faculty of Dentistry of Süleyman Demirel University. In the 2020-21 academic year, 92.2% of students who took the dental anatomy course in distance education voluntarily participated in this study (observation group). These data were compared with 34.6% of students who applied for 9-HPT in 2019-2020 in F2F education (control group). The Mann-Whitney U test and t-test were used for comparison. The significance level was taken as p < 0.05. Results: Based on the dominant hand 9-HPT score, a positive change occurred in 81.8% of the F2F and 61.6% of the online education students. Based on both dominant and nondominant hand 9-HPT scores, a statistically significant difference between the change in scores according to the fall/spring term measurements was observed in both F2F and distance education (p < 0.001). However, the F2F-educated group students showed better psychomotor skill development than those exposed to the online-educated group in 9-HPT. The results showed statistical significance for both dominant and nondominant hands (p < 0.001). Conclusion: The F2F education is the gold standard in psychomotor skill training; however, in cases where this approach cannot be realized, practical training protocols modified for online training may contribute to the motor development of students.

Turkish adaptation of the interprofessional attitude scale (IPAS).

The Interprofessional Attitude Scale (IPAS) was developed to measure the core competencies for interprofessional education and collaborative practice, which thepresent study aims to evaluate for adaptation into Turkish. The study was conducted with 254 students from four different faculties related to health sciences. The guideline by Sosua and Rojannasrirat (2011) was followed. Content validity analysis, descriptive analysis, exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, and correlation analysis were performed. Reliability was assessed using Cronbach's alpha. Descriptive analysis revealed that the majority of the participants agreed with the items (mean scale score was 160.99 ± 15.99). The Item and Scales content validity indices were 0.85-1.00 and 0.93 respectively. In the construct validity analysis, the scale was divided into five sub-dimensions at an acceptable level. The reliability coefficient was calculated as 0.87. In the analysis of scale items variance component percentages estimated for person, for items, and for person × item were 14.1%, 29%, and 56.9%, respectively. In conclusion, IPAS-TR is a valid and reliable tool that can be used to measure interprofessional attitudes.