Impact of Covid-19 Pandemic to Students Experiences of OSCE

Abstract

Background: practice-based learning has always been a key element of dental education, and the hours of practical learning during the COVID-19 pandemic has reduced, which may have led to student preparation for the (OSCE) - Objective Structured Clinical Examinations. Aim: to evaluate the impact of the pandemic on the opinion of 5th year students of the Dentistry program, of the Lithuanian University of Health Sciences about the OSCE. Methods: We used a self-administered 15-item questionnaire ((8) - practical and (7) - psychological questions). Each question was scored on a Likert scale (from completely disagree (score 1) to completely agree (score 5)). In May 2019 and May 2022 students were asked an anonymous self-administered written questionnaire after completing assignments of OSCE examination. 111 students in 2019 (response rate 100%) and 107 students in 2022 (response rate 89.17%) participated. Statistical analysis was performed with the SPSS-27. The MannWhitney test was used to calculate the results. The difference in data between two groups are Statistically significant when (p<?, ?=0.05). Results: A total of 231 students participated in the study, 208 of them answered all questions (94.37%). Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the average rating for practical questions - 3.36 (min.–1.3; max.–5, median-3,43), after the Covid-19 pandemic - 3.48 (min.-1,0; max.–5.0, median-3,57), (p=0.242). In 2019, the average rating for psychological questions - 3.52 (min.- 1.5; max.–5, median-3,5), in 2022 the average rating - 3.57 (min.–1.5; max.–5.0, median-3,63), (p=0.738). In 2022, the mean of practical and psychological questions is slightly bigger than in 2019, but there is no statistically significant difference (p=0.350). Conclusion: During the Covid-19 pandemic, the number of learning practices was reduced, this did not affect the experiences of the Lithuanian University of Health Sciences students who graduated from dentistry regarding the OSCE exam.