Community medicine teaching and evaluation: scope of betterment

There have been rapid and extensive changes in the way assessment is conducted in medical education. Assessment brings about standardization of the manner in which the syllabus is to be implemented and also gives guidelines regarding the teaching pattern, especially when the student is going to rotate through various departments in a medical college. Community Medicine is an important branch of medicine concerned with the health of populations. Existing forms of assessment of community medicine education mainly consists of internal [formative] assessment and final (summative) examination. Advantages of the present system is the similarity of the methods used for internal assessments and final examinations and is relatively easily done since only the knowledge application and recall ability of the student in theory and practical are assessed. Disadvantages in the current evaluation system are neglecting the assessment of psychomotor, affective and communication skills. Evaluation systems can be improved by implementing techniques to assess psychomotor skills, presentation and communication skills, organizational skills and the student's ability to work in a team. Regular feedback from students should be taken periodically for the betterment of Community Medicine education. This article is meant to sensitise the academic experts in medical education to plan better need based methods of assessment in the subject of Community Medicine, in relation to the new MCI 2012 Regulations, in order to make it a better learning experience for the students.