Development and Preliminary Evaluation of Student-Authored Electronic Cases

In human medical education, virtual patients are now widely used to support and enhance clinical teaching. However, there is still only a limited adoption of similar methods in veterinary education. This paper describes an initiative at the Royal Veterinary College (RVC) in London to develop student-authored cases during clinical rotations that were subsequently adapted for self-directed learning in the veterinary curriculum as virtual patients. This approach was designed to enhance the quality of the clinical learning experience, enhance the development of clinical reasoning skills, and complement the existing teaching caseload. Overall, the feedback suggested that the students found creating and using cases useful and that the experience improved their approach to similar cases.