The Journal of Medical Education and Development

Introduction : various methods of teaching have different learning outcomes. Using a combination of teaching and training methods of training may boost education. This study compared lecture based and case based teaching as a combined approach in learning general surgery by medical students.

Methods: This study was a quasi-experimental performed on two consecutive groups of 33 and 36 students who were studying general surgery course. The two styles of teaching were lecture-based and real case teaching methods. The final exam included twenty multiple choice questions. The mean scores of each group of students were collected and analyzed accordingly with descriptive tests, Fisher’s test and T-test.

Results: The mean final mark of students' who received real case based education was 16.8/20 ± 1.8 and for the lecture group was 12.7± 1.7. There was a significant difference between the two groups (P <0.0001). In both groups, there were significant differences in the mean scores of questions with taxonomy two and three, but not in the questions with taxonomy one. Students' evaluation score of the teacher of the real case group increased by 1.7/20 (8.7%) in the case based group compared to the lecture group.

Conclusions: Case based teaching of general surgery led to a better outcome and students were more satisfied. It is recommended that case based education of surgery be encouraged.