Perceptions of undergraduate medical students regarding institutional online teaching-learning programme

Medical education all over the country has been forced to shift to e-learning, mainly online classes. In this scenario, the medical education department (MEU) of a teaching hospital under a deemed university felt the need to study the satisfaction and usefulness of these classes, as perceived by the undergraduate medical students.

Questionnaire survey was planned. A specially designed questionnaire was created, keeping in mind, the study objectives. It was validated, and a pilot was conducted, for modifications and to calculate sample size. The questionnaire was administered by email as Google Forms. The responses, which included quantitative and qualitative responses, were analysed, and feedback points noted. Percentage level of satisfaction and usefulness was calculated with 95% confidence interval. To test the statistical significance of the association of satisfaction levels amongst students of different Phases, chi square test was used.

On a scale scoring for satisfaction, 53.6% scored moderate, 31% high, and 15.4% low satisfaction. 49.8% of the students were less satisfied about attending classes from home; 15.7% felt it was better. 57.1% of the students found the concept of online learning moderately useful, 31.4% found it minimally useful, 11.5%, highly useful.

The undergraduate medical students perceived moderate satisfaction and usefulness with the on-going online classes. They expressed the desire to resume routine physical classes, especially for practicals and clinics. Points of improvement of the online teaching-learning programme were also obtained. This study revealed sufficient feedback to be shared with all stakeholders, regarding improvements in the online classes.