Ophthalmic emergencies: training via interactive key feature cases for medical students

Background. Autonomous diagnosis and assessment of medical emergencies are important skills to acquire for medical students. Ophthalmology features certain specialty-specific red flag signs and symptoms, which pose a challenge for educators in ophthalmology. To support medical students in identifying those red flags we developed and implemented interactive cases for our e-learning platform. Material and methods. A total of seven interactive cases with key feature problems regarding potentially dangerous signs and symptoms, such as painless loss of vision or red eye were developed. Medical students were guided through a case and performed formative assessments. The interactive cases were created with e-learning authoring software and were available on the learning management system presence of the department of ophthalmology. They were mandatory for medical students in the ophthalmology course. Students evaluated the cases after the course. Results. The interactive cases were rated on average at 1.51 +/- 0.68 (mean +/- standard deviation; n = 163) on a grade scale (1 = best, 6 = worst). On a Likert scale they were perceived as helpful for individual learning at 1.60 +/- 0.81 (1 = very helpful, 7 = not helpful at all; n = 164). The information provided on the cases and selection of scenarios was positively evaluated. Conclusion. To support students in identifying and managing ophthalmic emergencies in the context of limited time in tightly packed curricula, interactive key feature cases can be part of corresponding e-learning resources. An integration of such cases was evaluated as desirable.