Curriculum for Undergraduate Medical Education in Bangladesh 2012: Reflection of Teachers' & Students' Expectation

Abstract

Background: Medical education is a dynamic and continuous process. Curriculum for under-graduate medical education in Bangladesh has updated in 2012. Before 2012 it was updated in 2002. Objective: To explore the students' and teachers' feedback on the structure and contents of the undergraduate MBBS curriculum 2002 and reflection of their expectation in latest update, undergraduate MBBS curriculum 2012. Methods: A total of 845 students and 171 teachers of Rajshahi Medical College and Islamic Bank Medical College, Rajshahi, Bangladesh participated in this study. Students' and teachers' perceptions and suggestions regarding the undergraduate MBBS curriculum 2002 were measured in 2009 before update it by a pretested self-administered questionnaire. Data were analyzed by SPSS for windows. Descriptive analytical techniques involving frequency distribution, computation of percentage etc. were done. Results: Of the 845 students and 171 teachers, 404 (47.8%) students and 119 (69.6%) teachers were not in favor of the frame work of Phase II of the curriculum updated in 2002. Majority of them suggested to spilt the 2 years of phase II into two equal parts, 1 year each. Of the 845 students and 171 teachers, 361 (42.7%) students and 30 (17.5%) teachers perceived that the contents of the curriculum were overloaded. More than 65% of the students and 61.4% of the teachers were not in favor of 6 monthly professional examination scheduled. Majority of them suggested 3 monthly schedules of the professional examination. Conclusion: The unmet issues of recent updated undergraduate curriculum, like subject distribution in Phase II and Phase III, content overload and provision of professional examination at the 3 months interval should be considered during the future curriculum review.