Text4Peds: Short Message Service Evaluating Medical Student Education

November 14, 2017 updated by: Matthew A. Broom, MD, FAAP, St. Louis University

Text4Peds: Randomized Controlled Trial Evaluating Medical Student Education

In this study, third year medical students on the pediatric clerkship will be randomized to receive either only written educational material (review journal articles) or written educational material plus daily text messages consisting of board style questions with online answers. The students' performance on the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) Pediatric Subject Evaluation will be compared between the two groups.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

In the last decade, the use of smartphone and text messaging (SMS) has increased significantly; during this time, text messaging has become the primary means of communication in some instances. Despite the popularity, text messaging and smartphones have been rarely utilized in the context of medical education. Few studies have been performed examining the effect of text messaging as an adjunct to traditional medical education. A previous study with the Saint Louis University (SLU) Pediatric Residency program, showed the feasibility of using text messaging to deliver medical information to pediatric residents through the Text4Peds program.

This study aims to expand Text4Peds to third NBME Pediatric Subject Evaluation performance. The NBME Pediatric Subject Evaluation is a national, standardized pediatric knowledge based exam from the NBME taken by all medical students at the end of their pediatric clerkship.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

162

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Locations

  • United States
    • Missouri
      • Saint Louis, Missouri, United States, 63104
        • St Louis University

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

20 years to 50 years (Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Third year medical students on the Pediatric Clerkship at Saint Louis University School of Medicine

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Third year medical students who did not have a mobile phone capable of receiving a short message service (SMS) text message

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Other
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Texting Group
The texting group received a daily text message containing a board style multiple choice question. If the participant wanted immediate feedback, the message contained a link to a website containing the answer to the question along with an explanation, the source material, and a more complete clinical vignette. One hour after the initial text message was sent, a follow up "answer" text message was delivered. Text messages were sent 6 days per week (Monday through Saturday) at 2 pm and 3 pm.
Other: Texting Group
See above in arm/group description
Active Comparator: Non Texting Group
The non-texting group received access to the journal articles from which the text message content was derived, but did not receive any text messages or any of the online material or question stems.
Other: Non Texting Group
See above in arm/group description

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
National Board of Medical Examiners Pediatric Subject Examination
Time Frame: Assessed at end of intervention (after 8 weeks)
The NBME pediatrics subject examination is used to assess medical student knowledge and is a common component of the pediatric clerkship grade. It is also used to compare medical student performance to a national benchmark. NBME scores are on a scale of 0-100 (% correct); mean score for this exam during year of evaluation was 75.7 (SD 8.7).
Assessed at end of intervention (after 8 weeks)

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

St. Louis University

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Christopher Brownsworth, MD, St. Louis University

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Actual)

May 2, 2016

Primary Completion (Actual)

April 28, 2017

Study Completion (Actual)

April 28, 2017

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

October 30, 2017

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

November 14, 2017

First Posted (Actual)

November 17, 2017

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

November 17, 2017

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

November 14, 2017

Last Verified

November 1, 2017

More Information

Terms related to this study

Other Study ID Numbers

  • 26458

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

NO

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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