Abstract

PRIDA REINALDO, Maribel  and  RAMOS HERNANDEZ, Leonardo. Summer courses, an extension educational strategy. Educ Med Super [online]. 2012, vol.26, n.4, pp. 522-530. ISSN 0864-2141.

Introduction: the authors were motivated by the worries and interests of the students from the Medical Formation Program implemented by Cuban health professionals in Zanzibar, Tanzania. Objective: to assess the results of a summer extension course strategy in students of the new medical training program in Zanzibar. Methods: a cross-sectional descriptive study was carried out with 2nd year medical students of the medical school of Zanzibar from October 2009 to January 2011. It was performed in three stages: identification of learning needs, implementation of the strategy (3 courses associated to identification of learning needs), and evaluation. For the primary data collection, some questionnaires referred to the variables of interest were designed. Results: three courses containing the most requested topics by the students were taught, namely, introduction to medical semiotics, medical emergencies and hemotheraphy, which were rated as the first and the second priority for over 40 % of students. Of the participants, 94.5 % considered that the objectives were met and fully met; 90 % believed that all the courses were interesting or very interesting; 100 % regarded them as much updated courses and 95.9 % rated them as good and very good. The professors stated that they were very satisfied with the high interest of the students, their participation, their attendance to the course, the preparation of the students for the debate of several topics, the reflections on and the critical assessment of the given subjects. Conclusions: the strategy of summer courses put into practice was one choice for meeting the learning requirements of students from the university extension program, and for encouraging them to deal with new topics in the forthcoming periods. Both the professors and the students positively assessed the implementation of this type of courses.

Keywords : summer courses; extension strategy.

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