General physicians graduated from a PBL undergraduate medical curriculum: how well do they perform as PBL tutors?

A study was conducted on the effectiveness of general physicians recently graduated from a medical school with Problem-Based Learning (PBL) curriculum as PBL tutors to expand the school's tutor pool.

This study aims to investigate these non-staff tutors' effectiveness in terms of student satisfaction and learning outcomes.

An experimental study was conducted of 12 PBL groups of second-year medical students (n = 40). Four PBL groups were led by non-staff tutors; the other eight groups were led by staff tutors during the two PBL units. Tutor evaluation and student satisfaction questionnaires were administered and student performance scores were analysed to compare between groups led by staff tutors and non-staff tutors.

The students' overall satisfaction with the non-staff tutors on a five-point Likert-scale was high (M = 4.5 +/-.638). Additionally, the student scores on written tests were comparable between groups. Yet, in one unit, the groups led by staff tutors received significantly higher scores on the group evaluation than those led by non-staff tutors.

The results of this study show that the non-staff tutors performed as effectively as the staff tutors did with regard to student achievement in written exams. Still, the findings of this study suggest that different tutor backgrounds and experiences might affect student performance beyond the written exam scores.