JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Since 2021, the histology of organs in microscopic anatomy course at the Department of Anatomy II of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich has been held as a hybrid course using the three-dimensional (3D) virtual microscopy system, Histologi@. Students could choose to participate face-to-face or online, i.e., the instructions were streamed synchronously via the broadcast system Zoom from the microscopic laboratory. Whether the two modi are equal in terms of learning outcome or whether certain groups of students require additional support from the instructors during one of the modi has not been investigated yet.

Objective:

This study is the first to systematically investigate whether the mode of instruction (online versus face-to-face) influences the learning outcomes of preclinical students with consideration of selected demographic characteristics and personal skills when live broadcast teaching is combined with the use of a virtual slide box featuring 3D slides generated from fully scanned histological glass slides previously used in a traditional course on microscopic anatomy.

Methods:

In order to ensure that learning outcomes reflected the learning outcome after the two different course modi delivered within the scope of this study rather than being influenced by external learning sources, two particularly challenging course days were intentionally selected, and the time interval before the simulated exam was kept short: the students attended two consecutive course days on two topics (kidney and liver) in a crossover design. Half of the students attended the first day face-to-face and the second day online, the other half of the students attended in the reverse order. The survey on demographic characteristics and personal skills and the simulated test, to determine whether there is a difference between attending online versus face-to-face and whether certain demographic characteristics (e.g., affinity for technology interaction) can predict the simulated test results, was conducted immediately on the next day.

Results:

Overall, N=740 students´ questionnaires and exams (83% of the total student cohort) were analyzed with the result that there was no significant difference in the learning outcomes between students attending the course face-to-face or online and no tested demographic characteristic or personal skill predicted learning outcome.

Conclusions:

The results of this study suggest that the microscopic anatomy learning outcome of students can be considered equivalent in online and face-to-face teaching and that both modi are equally suited for students in this study regarding the investigated demographic and personal characteristics.