{'fraction_non_alphanumeric': 0.026148409893992933, 'fraction_numerical': 0.005653710247349823, 'mean_word_length': 5.616822429906542, 'pattern_counts': {'":': 0, '<': 0, '<?xml version=': 0, '>': 0, 'https://': 0, 'lorem ipsum': 0, 'www.': 0, 'xml': 0}, 'pii_count': 0, 'substrings_counts': 0, 'word_list_counts': {'cursed_substrings.json': 0, 'profanity_word_list.json': 0, 'sexual_word_list.json': 0, 'zh_pornsignals.json': 0}}
Facilitation of Problem Finding Among First Year Medical School Students Undergoing Problem-Based Learning

Background: Adaptation to problem-based learning (PBL) is a difficult process for high school graduates who are not used to self-directed learning, especially in the freshmen year of medical school. The difficulty includes finding problems from a given case. Purpose: Evaluate the effect of an intervention to facilitate case-based problem finding among medical school freshmen undergoing a PBL tutorial. Methods: Medical school freshmen in 2000 (nonintervened group) and 2001 (intervened group) participated in the study. The intervened group received the modified problem-based program by (a) having briefings on the importance of problem finding, (b) encouragement by the tutors in problem finding, and (c) reinforcement using a self-assessment sheet. At the end of the year, the ability of students to extract problems from a short case was evaluated and compared with the nonintervened students. Results: The intervened group extracted a significantly greater number of problems than the nonintervened group. When extracted problems were categorized, the intervened group was able to generate more questions in a greater number of specified categories. Conclusions: Interventions to foster problem finding significantly facilitated acquisition of problem extraction skills among young medical students.