Catherine Hennessy

Social media and anatomy education: Using twitter to enhance the student learning experience in anatomy

Neuroanatomy is a difficult subject in medical education, with students often feeling worried and anxious before they have even started, potentially decreasing their engagement with the subject. At the University of Southampton, we incorporated the use of Twitter as a way of supporting students learning on a neuroanatomy module to evaluate how it impacted upon their engagement and learning experience. The #nlm2soton hashtag was created and displayed (via a widget) on the universitys virtual learning environment (VLE) for a cohort of 197 Year 2 medical students studying neuroanatomy. Student usage was tracked to measure levels of engagement throughout the course and frequency of hashtag use was compared to examination results. Student opinions on the use of Twitter were obtained during a focus group with eleven students and from qualitative questionnaires. The hashtag was used by 91% of the student cohort and, within this, more students chose to simply view the hashtag rather than make contributions. The completed questionnaire responses (nu2009=u2009150) as well as focus group outcomes revealed the value of using Twitter. A negligible correlation was found between student examination scores and their viewing frequency of the hashtag however, no correlation was found between examination scores and contribution frequency. Despite this, Twitter facilitated communication, relieved anxieties and raised morale, which was valued highly by students and aided engagement with neuroanatomy. Twitter was successful in creating and providing a support network for students during a difficult module. Anat Sci Educ 9: 505–515.

The Anatomical Society core anatomy syllabus for pharmacists: outcomes to create a foundation for practice

The Anatomical Society has developed a series of learning outcomes that ‘experts’ within the field would recommend as core knowledge outputs for a Masters Degree Programme in Pharmacy (MPharm) within the UK. Using the Anatomical Society core gross anatomy syllabus for medical anatomy as a foundation, a modified Delphi technique was used to develop outcomes specific to pharmacy graduates. A Delphi panel consisting of medical practitioners, pharmacists and anatomists (n = 39) was created and involved ‘experts’ representing 20 UK Higher Education Institutions. The output from this study was 49 pharmacy‐specific learning outcomes that are applicable to all pharmacy programmes. The new MPharm anatomy syllabus offers a basic anatomical framework upon which pharmacy educators can build the necessary clinical practice and knowledge. These learning outcomes could be used to develop anatomy teaching within an integrated curriculum as per requirements of the General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC).

Lifting the negative cloud of social media use within medical education

The number of anatomy educators using popular social media platforms such as YouTube (Jaffar, 2012), Facebook (Jaffar, 2014), and Twitter (Hennessy et al., 2016) to support their students has increased over recent years. Journals and conferences related to medical education are showing support for the scholarship of such work as it becomes more apparent that social media is ingrained in how today’s students communicate and source information (Barry et al., 2016). During the recent joint summer meeting of The Anatomical Society and British Association of Clinical Anatomists (held at Brighton Sussex Medical School, Brighton, UK on July 19–21, 2016), two further examples of academic social media platforms were described, one using Facebook (Pickering and Bickerdike, 2016) and one using Twitter (Gunn et al., 2016). Similar to the findings by Cheston et al. (2013) and George et al. (2013), in each of the reports listed in the previous paragraph, student feedback from academic social media platforms was considerably positive. In each case, students felt that the platform was useful for supporting their anatomy learning. Other benefits that students frequently reported were: facilitating communication with tutors, promoting discussion and engagement with the subject (Jaffar, 2014; Hennessy et al., 2016), and decreasing student anxieties (Hennessy et al., 2016; Pickering and Bickerdike, 2016). Although educators rarely make the use of these platforms compulsory, the favorable percentage uptake demonstrated by students [86% of cohort reported by Jaffar (2012); 23% by George et al. (2013); 89% by Jaffar (2014); 91% by Hennessy et al. (2016); 48% by Pickering and Bickerdike (2016), and 31% by Gunn et al. (2016)] suggests that they are interested and willing to engage with academic social media platforms. However, I have noticed one emerging trend from these reports—that only a minority of students actively make contributions to the platforms, instead the majority of students decide to simply visit and view the contributions made by others (Hennessy et al., 2016; Pickering and Bickerdike, 2016). What is the reason for this? Originally, I had accepted this as normal behavior since White and Le Cornu (2011) described internet users as either “residents” or “visitors” and concluded that visitors (observers) predominate over a small number of noisy residents (contributors) and like one student explained to me during a previous focus group: “You’re always going to get those people who have no problem with asking questions and that would be the minority. . . . it’s the same in lectures, it’s always the same ones that ask the questions.” But I have come to realize that there is another major factor limiting, as one student explained in a more recent focus group: “We’ve all got this inherent fear of sticking our neck on the line for the fear that you’ll just end up coming out worse than you would otherwise. The whole process of getting into medical school. . .. . ..is a massive competition so you don’t want to be seen to be stupid or. . .. . .like you don’t know something.” Pickering and Bickerdike (2016) supported this finding and reported that males are significantly less likely to ask a question on social media platforms in case they are perceived to lack knowledge. I recently learned that during their orientation week at medical school, students receive a very negative message about social media from curriculum leaders as they raised the issue of professionalism. One student recalled being warned as follows: “your social media account. . ..we’re not monitoring it but if you say something or do something strange or criminal, it’s going to come back and bite you. . ..nothing is invisible.” Another student described the underlying feeling and belief amongst medical students that the “GMC [General Medical Council] are everywhere” monitoring and recording any unruly behavior on social media or otherwise which could damage their record and influence their career progression. Langenfeld et al. (2016) reported that such practice does take place in areas of the United States with 18% of surgical program directors visiting social media profiles of medical students and 45% visiting profiles of surgical residents, often resulting in candidates being lowered in rank or formally disciplined based on their social media behavior. Although one could argue that this is an invasion of privacy, most of the program directors did not concur, instead believing that medical professionals should be held accountable for their online behavior (Langenfeld et al., 2016) regardless of the intended audience. This seems a good argument since online social media content is open to the public, unless appropriate privacy settings are in place. By virtue of this fact, Langenfeld et al. (2014) observed that 26% of surgical resident exhibited unprofessional or potentially unprofessional behavior on Facebook, therefore it is not only medical students who are at risk of unprofessionalism online. *Correspondence to: Miss Catherine Hennessy, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, University of Sussex, Medical School Building, Falmer, BN1 9PX, United Kingdom. E-mail: c.hennessy@bsms.ac.uk

Examining the impact of audience response systems on student performance in anatomy education : a randomized controlled trial

Background and aims Electronic audience response systems offer the potential to enhance learning and improve performance. However, objective research investigating the use of audience response systems in undergraduate education has so far produced mixed, inconclusive results. We investigated the impact of audience response systems on short- and long-term test performance, as well as student perceptions of the educational experience, when integrated into undergraduate anatomy teaching. Methods and results A cohort of 70 undergraduate medical students was randomly allocated to one of the two groups. Both groups received the same anatomy lecture, but one group experienced the addition of audience response systems. Multiple-choice tests were conducted before, immediately after the lecture and again 10 weeks later. Self-perceived post-lecture subject knowledge, confidence and enjoyment ratings did not differ between groups. Test performance immediately following the lecture improved when compared against baseline and was modestly but significantly superior in the group taught with audience response systems (mean test score of 17.3/20 versus 15.6/20 in the control group, p = 0.01). Tests conducted 10 weeks after the lecture showed no difference between groups (p = 0.61), although overall a small improvement from the baseline test was maintained (pu2009=u20090.02). Conclusions Whilst audience response systems offer opportunities to deliver novel education experiences to students, an initial superiority over standard methods does not necessarily translate into longer term gains in student performance when employed in the context of anatomy education.

Live Tweeting at Anatomical Society conferences: a short history of its rise and impact

Background: Social media (SoMe) are increasingly becoming fundamental components of networking and dissemination at academic conferences, for which Twitter can be a valuable tool [1,2]. We sought to investigate the role, usage and contributions of Twitter at Anatomical Society (AS) conferences in order to identify the value of this approach to delegates, members and the Society. The increased availability and utility of SoMe analytics have allowed detailed investigations of SoMe activity to be performed.Transition pedagogy utilises curriculum approaches that aid student engagement, success and retention. This is typically applied to First Year Higher Education (FYHE) students. However, the transition from preclinical to clinical studies within many medical programs represents a similar shift in the student learning experience. Here we describe the intentional curriculum design of clinical anatomy and pathology in year 4 of a 6-year MBBS program. The six First Year Curriculum (FYC) principles of transition, diversity, design, engagement, assessment and evaluation/monitoring have been embedded within the year 4 program. n nTransitioning students from the learning of foundation science to the advanced application of scientific principles is organised through integrated teaching (and assessment) of clinical anatomy, pathology, clinical examination and evaluation. This learning is contextualised within various healthcare settings: primary health, hospital inpatient and outpatient and rural placement. n nThe integrated teaching design provides an explicit foundation for scaffolding the transition from the preclinical to the clinical context, while utilising curriculum design principles that promote active, collaborative learning and engagement that is consistent with the clinical workplace. Assessment is aligned to this integrated approach through the use of case-based clinical practical exams, and theory papers. n nStudent diversity is primarily addressed through years 1–3 of the program, through the scaffolding of practical and generic skills that assist students with the demands of university study. This is supplemented in the clinical transition through a clinical mentoring program and a number of reflective activities that help students and staff to evaluate progress throughout the transition year and enable timely interventions (such as additional skills sessions) to be accessed. n nLastly, evaluation of the new curriculum is conducted regularly, especially during this implementation phase and is conducted through a combination of externally benchmarked, institution-wide, and college-specific feedback tools. n nHaving utilised FYC principles in the design of the year 4 program, further work is now needed to see how the curriculum impacts upon the transition to clinical study, the students experiences, progression and the employer feedback. However, initial feedback has shown a positive improvement on students experiences of the transition to clinical study. n nNo ethical approval was required.