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PURPOSE: To compare clinical performances in a third-year medicine clerkship between studies from a problem-based learning (PBL) curriculum and students from a traditional, lecture-based learning (LBL) curriculum. METHOD: The study participants were 88 PBL students and 364 LBL students rotating through a common third-year internal medicine clerkship at the Bowman Gray School of Medicine at Wake Forest University, classes of 1991-1995. Faculty and housestaff assessed the students' performances using four clinical rating scales. The student also completed the medicine student ("shelf") test of the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME). RESULTS: On average, the PBL students received significantly higher ratings from housestaff and faculty on all four rating scales. No difference in scores on the NBME medicine shelf test was observed. CONCLUSION: The results support the hypothesis that preclinical PBL curricula as found at the Bowman Gray School of Medicine may enhance third-year students' clinical performances.
Richards et al. (Thu,) studied this question.