34 - Librarian Involvement in Medical Students’ EBM Assessment: Does It Help?

Background: The multi-station, summative OSCE includes a case designed to assess third-year medical students’ ability to access information at the point of care using Evidence-Based Medicine (EBM) resources. Over the years, students have perceived this case to be difficult and confusing, which resulted in low performance. To address these concerns, a librarian-led EBM case learning session was developed and integrated into the formative, practice OSCE starting in 2018. The goals of the session were to increase understanding of how to search the vetted resource effectively and efficiently, incorporate evidence into practice, and emphasize the importance of EBM in clinical care.

Description: The EBM case learning session was developed by the medical librarians, OSCE director, and OSCE committee using a case previously designed for the high stakes OSCE. The librarian-led session is presented to small groups of students on a rotating schedule. Librarians first demonstrate how to navigate the preferred information resource and its health information materials. Students are then given a clinical problem and case instructions based on a standardized patient (SP) scenario. Students take a quiz designed to answer the clinical question and guide them to the information necessary to provide a diagnosis and treatment plan. Students watch and evaluate a recorded previous student performance after the quiz. Finally, students debrief with librarians to further reinforce their findings, current topical knowledge, and the SP's preferences when communicating the diagnosis and treatment plan. Afterward, Students complete an evaluation of the session.

Conclusion: To date, 268 students have participated in the EBM case learning session. Students complete evaluations for the practice session, and performance scores are collected for the EBM case during the high stakes OSCE. Upon data review, results indicate that students’ understanding of the EBM case improved after the implementation of the learning session, as well as their perception of case difficulty and overall case performance. Data continues to be collected and analyzed.