[Problems facing undergraduate clinical practice training in laboratory medicine and proposed solution: remodeling of...

It is essential that medical students learn how to precisely assess the results of laboratory tests. This may be accomplished by improving students' understanding of the processes involved in the laboratory testing of specimens, from blood collection to analysis, and by discovering factors that may influence these processes and impact results. Currently, medical students are generally taught the process by using a large automatic analyzer. However, because the students cannot observe the actual operation of the analyzer, they do not learn the process of analysis, that is, the chemical analysis of the specimen. To solve this problem, we remodeled a point-of-care automatic analyzer. The analyzer enabled students to observe its actual operation during specimen analysis. We used this analyzer for clinical practice training and obtained information on its effectiveness as a learning tool by means of a questionnaire survey. The questionnaire survey indicated that most of the students agree that the analyzer helped them learn more about the following, aspects of clinical practice: general clinical laboratory medicine (68.5%); method of analysis (57.5%); sampling method (70.0%); and point-of-care tests (52.8%). Above all, 60% of the students became interested in clinical laboratory medicine after their practical experience with the analyzer. The analyzer enables medical students to observe directly the process of biochemical analyses, and is a valuable learning tool for the students.