A Prospective, Pre- and Post-comparative Study to assess Knowledge about Medical Writing

Background Medical writing is an important component of any research starting with writing a research protocol up to its culmination into presentations and publications. In spite of numerous mandatory academic projects being undertaken in India, the research output in peer-reviewed journals remains low. Lack of proficiency in medical writing has been cited as one of the important causes for same. We conducted a pre- and post-continued medical education (CME) multiple choice questions (MCQs) questionnaire test to assess the baseline knowledge of the participants in this field and observe their improvement after the CME. Materials and methods 210 medical students and faculty from various medical disciplines participated in the workshop. Responses to a 15 item validated MCQs questionnaire under various headings such as literature search, spectrum of formats, statistics, references and reporting were collected from the participants of the CME. Results 40.48% of the participants responded for pre-CME questionnaire forms and 36.67% for the post-CME questionnaire forms. In the post-CME questionnaire, a vast improvement was obtained in almost all questions, observed most prominently in the sections on literature search, referencing and reporting guidelines. Conclusion Training programs in medical writing should be included as a part of the curriculum from undergraduate days. Till the time that this becomes a reality, we should continue to equip ourselves with good medical writing skills by organizing such educative programs. How to cite this article Salgaonkar S, Wajekar AS, Lakhotia A. A Prospective, Pre- and Post-comparative Study to assess Knowledge about Medical Writing. Res Inno in Anesth 2017;2(1):1-3.