Medical students' perspectives on biomedical informatics learning objectives

Objectives: To explore medical student perspectives regarding the importance of biomedical informatics learning objectives to career development, and the amount of emphasis that should be placed on content associated with these objectives in the curriculum. Methods: A Web-based survey was e-mailed to 405 students enrolled at the University of Utah, School of Medicine in spring 2008. Respondents rated the importance of biomedical informatics learning objectives using a five-point Likert-type scale, and indicated whether this content should be given a minimal, moderate or large amount of emphasis. ANOVA and the Kruskal-Wallis test were conducted to determine differences in perceived importance and desired emphasis by academic year. Results: A total of 259 medical students submitted a survey for an overall response rate of 63.9 Learning objectives associated with the physician role of Clinician received the highest overall rating (mean = 3.29 ± 0.47). Objectives for the physician roles of Clinician, Life-long Learner and Manager received higher ratings than the Educator/Communicator and Researcher roles in terms of both perceived importance and amount of emphasis. Student ratings of importance varied significantly by academic year, with third-year students consistently assigning lower ratings to learning objectives for the Educator/Communicator, Researcher and Manager roles compared to students in some other years. Conclusions: Study results suggest that biomedical informatics content is desired by medical students at the University of Utah. Study findings are being used to inform efforts to integrate biomedical informatics content into the curriculum and may assist other medical schools seeking to incorporate similar content.