Medical students, medical records and clinical skills

140 Liverpool medical undergraduates from all three clinical years completed a two part questionnaire. The first part gave their opinion on the contents of medical case records and how they personally recorded and used them. The second part showed the usefulness to students of their teachers' assessments of their clinical skills. The results indicated that the present case record and assessment of clinical skills were unhelpful in the students' education. The type of record-keeping which students thought best was very similar to the problem-orientated medical record (POMR). The kind of assessment of clinical skills which they would like was very similar to the educational audit linked with POMR. In view of these findings, the introduction of POMR into the undergraduate curriculum is strongly advocated.