Hi lovelies!
Last weekend I had the grand pleasure of attending and presenting my research at the MANSAG Education Symposium which very conveniently took place just 10 minutes away from my house haha. My friend Kemi sent me the call for abstracts poster and I had just finished a paper titled “recognizing the social causes of underperformance in medical education: a scoping review” so I thought – why not? I might get accepted and I’d be excited to share my findings because it’s a subject I’m really passionate about – and I was accepted!
To give you some context, underperformance basically means exam failure, and in the UK, medical exams at both the undergraduate and postgraduate level are marked in domains – meaning you have to succeed at correctly getting the diagnosis (clinical knowledge) the method of deducing the diagnosis (clinical reasoning) as well as how you come across in the consultation (interpersonal skills). To pass the exam, you have to succeed in ALL these domains. Now, clinical knowledge and reasoning is down to how much you study and practice, but you see that ‘how you come across’? That’s the subjective area that some people feel is measuring how much of a ‘British doctor’ you are. If you have lived in the UK all your life and belong to a certain social class, you know the mannerisms and nuances that make that domain of the exam easy for you – you just have to be your natural self – but if you grew up in a different culture; this domain is where you most likely won’t find easy to pass – and could cost you the whole exam. So it’s easy to see why this topic is very close to my heart, as I know how hard it is for international medical graduates to pass UK medical exams because of this barrier – which motivated me to find out what’s being said about it in the literature – basically seeing if anyone else has spoken up in research about it.
My research found that the top three social causes of underperformance in medical education were: lack of social capital, cross cultural differences and differences in the locus of responsibility.
Lack of social capital: people from certain backgrounds don’t have access to medical role models and so don’t have the natural ability to present themselves as one since they’ve never seen it.
Cross cultural differences: how people communicate differs across cultures, some cultures are more exuberant than others and can be misread as a result.
Differences in locus of responsibility: study styles differ across different regions, the western education has moved to a more interactive style called problem based learning, whereas other cultures still use rote learning where the teacher is right and all you have to do is listen and regurgitate what you’ve been taught. Coming to a place that requires your active participation in order to succeed but you don’t realize this expectation, can lead to misunderstanding.
So yeah! I’m definitely going to keep doing more research on this topic with the hopes of getting the problem acknowledged and then resolved by the educational bodies – so my people stop struggling unnecessarily!
Back to the symposium! I had such a lovely time both during my own session which was really interactive as well as listening to other people talk about their work; it’s amazing how much quality research Nigerians are doing across the UK and it felt empowering to belong to part of such a community.
I also was a close runner up for best oral presentation which I’m very proud of as I only just started my formal research presentation experience last month!
I got to catch up with old friends that I used to work with back as a medical student in the Nigerian medical student association (NiMSA) and the international federation of medical students association (IFMSA); it’s been beautiful to see us all progressing in our chosen fields.
Also met the founder of Marcelle Ruth Centre, a leading cancer centre in Lagos and she was very kind – she commended me on how much she enjoyed my presentation which made me feel quite proud of myself, I must admit. I couldn’t have ever thought I’d be this person that is so keen about research! But having worked in health policy for a while as well as medicine – I recognize that research is the beginning of change, as it provides the evidence needed to support the existence of an issue and garner support from the people and organizations who have the power to make decisions that solve the problems. So I’ve been working on my research skills and it’s been an honor to see it already yielding fruit at such an early stage. I’m also a published researcher! Yes, my accepted abstract was published in the Journal of Global Medicine – in my new name too hehehe – here’s a link to the paper:
https://globalmedicine.co.uk/index.php/jogm/article/view/167/571
Here are a few more photos from the charity ball that followed after the symposium!
I exchanged contacts with a number of people who are interested in collaborating with me on this topic – so watch this space!
Till next time,
Dr ETK xo
