Previously submitted to: Journal of Medical Internet Research (no longer under consideration since Apr 14, 2023)
Date Submitted: Nov 24, 2022
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Development and Application of the WeChat Public Account “I Love Parasitology” in the Teaching of Human Parasitology
ABSTRACT
Background:
Digital approaches have been demonstrated to transform medical education to achieve higher levels of knowledge and skills through competency-based education. The quick and instant communication function of WeChat public accounts enables teachers and students notifications and interactive feedback anytime and anywhere, which will facilitate a student-centered teaching mode.
Objective:
To better construct teaching resources and improve teaching quality of parasitology, our team set up a WeChat public account “I love Parasitology”, which was used as an auxiliary communication platform during our routine teaching.
Methods:
The data sources were mainly from original pictures and multimedia materials of different parasites collected and produced by our team, as well as related materials collected from traditional publications and new media. All materials were reclassified and packaged according to the teaching schedule. Furthermore, with the instant interactive platform, course schedules and corresponding teaching contents were sent by push notifications, case-based learning was carried out, and two-way communication between students and teachers was achieved. Teaching effectiveness was assessed using a self-evaluation questionnaire.
Results:
A WeChat public account suitable for our daily teaching of parasitology was established. The second recursion and implementation of the learning resources allowed students to conduct in-depth reading and get unrestricted access to high-quality resources through the public account. In addition, all contents were in digital forms and made the original resources reborn, which would make up for our current and future shortage of physical teaching specimens. Moreover, the results from the questionnaire indicated that all these actions promoted students to master theoretical knowledge, improved their abilities of case analysis and of communication, and increased their knowledge of academic progress.
Conclusions:
Our WeChat public account can provide excellent learning materials for students and is a good supplement to the routine education of human parasitology. With the advances in the information age, new media as a communication tool will accelerate further advancement of medical teaching, thus innovating medical education methods.
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