Risk Literacy Among Portuguese Medical and Dentistry Students

Medical Education Clinical Trial

— RiskommPt  

Official title:

Risk Literacy Among Portuguese Medical and Dentistry Students - a Cohort Study

Clinical Trial Details — Status: Completed

Administrative data

• NCT number: NCT04380428
• Other study ID #: HC2019/11
• Status: Completed
• Start date: June 15, 2020
• Est. completion date: July 31, 2020

Study information

• Verified date: February 2021
• Source: Harding Center for Risk Literacy
• Contact: n/a
• Is FDA regulated: No
• Study type: Observational

Clinical Trial Summary

This study is an online survey to assess risk literacy among students of the medical and dentistry faculties in Portugal. Risk literacy is the capability to understand and interpret statistical information, based on simple rules of thumb.

The investigators assess the level of "medical risk literacy" among Portuguese medical and dentistry students with the Quick Risk Test (QRT) and the multiple choice version of the Berlin Numeracy Test (BNT).

Description:

This study is an online survey to assess risk literacy among students of the medical and dentistry faculties in Portugal.

The primary outcome is the measurement of "medical risk literacy" among Portuguese medical and dentistry students as assessed with the Quick Risk Test (QRT) and the multiple choice version of the Berlin Numeracy Test (BNT).

Secondary outcomes is to investigate whether study year, faculty, and prior statistical education have an impact on the level of risk literacy. Participants will be invited via email through established faculty mailing lists or established social media channels. For the survey, an online-survey tool (Unipark, academic program or Questback) will be used. Participation is voluntary and can be withdrawn at any time by aborting the survey (e.g. via closing the browser). Informed consent will be acquired at the beginning of the survey. English and Portuguese versions will be available to the participant.

As incentive to participate, participants completing the brief (ca.15 minutes) online-questionnaire will be granted a free subscriptions to the AMBOSS medical learning platform (2 weeks) and have the option to be entered into a lottery with the possibility of winning one of 3 free 6 month subscriptions.

After completion of the questionnaire, participants will be re-directed to a dedicated AMBOSS website where they can enter their email-address to take part in the lottery. This assures strict separation of the anonymous experimental data and the AMBOSS subscription data. Prior to initiation of the questionnaire, in the invitation email, participants will be provided the full participant information and made aware that, due to anonymity, it will not be possible to retrospectively delete their responses once the survey has been completed.

As the primary outcome is a baseline assessment and the secondary outcomes are exploratory analyses, no hypotheses will be tested in this survey.

Recruitment information / eligibility

• Status: Completed
• Enrollment: 950
• Est. completion date: July 31, 2020
• Est. primary completion date: July 31, 2020
• Accepts healthy volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers
• Gender: All
• Age group: 18 Years to 65 Years

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• medical and dentistry students of Portuguese faculties

• active matriculation at a Portuguese faculty

• completion of the questionnaire

Exclusion Criteria:

• no active matriculation at a Portuguese faculty

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Decision Support Techniques
• Medical Education

Intervention

Other:
• No Intervention. Observational study.
No Intervention. Observational study.

Locations

Country	Name	City	State
Germany	Harding Center for Risk Literacy	Potsdam	Brandenburg

Sponsors (1)

Lead Sponsor	Collaborator
Harding Center for Risk Literacy

Country where clinical trial is conducted

Germany, 

References & Publications (10)

Caverly TJ, Prochazka AV, Combs BP, Lucas BP, Mueller SR, Kutner JS, Binswanger I, Fagerlin A, McCormick J, Pfister S, Matlock DD. Doctors and numbers: an assessment of the critical risk interpretation test. Med Decis Making. 2015 May;35(4):512-24. doi: 10.1177/0272989X14558423. Epub 2014 Nov 5. Erratum in: Med Decis Making. 2015 May;35(4):410. McCormick, Jacqueline [added]; Pfister, Shirley [added]. — View Citation

Correction: Assessing minimal medical statistical literacy using the Quick Risk Test: a prospective observational study in Germany. BMJ Open. 2018 Oct 18;8(10):e020847corr2. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2017-020847corr2. — View Citation

Corrigendum: doctors and numbers: an assessment of the critical risk interpretation test. Med Decis Making. 2015 May;35(4):410. doi: 10.1177/0272989X15585799. — View Citation

Garcia-Retamero R, Cokely ET, Ghazal S, Joeris A. Measuring Graph Literacy without a Test: A Brief Subjective Assessment. Med Decis Making. 2016 Oct;36(7):854-67. doi: 10.1177/0272989X16655334. Epub 2016 Jun 27. — View Citation

Garcia-Retamero R, Galesic M, Gigerenzer G. Enhancing understanding and recall of quantitative information about medical risks: a cross-cultural comparison between Germany and Spain. Span J Psychol. 2011 May;14(1):218-26. — View Citation

Gigerenzer G, Wegwarth O. Five year survival rates can mislead. BMJ. 2013 Jan 29;346:f548. doi: 10.1136/bmj.f548. Review. — View Citation

Jenny MA, Keller N, Gigerenzer G. Assessing minimal medical statistical literacy using the Quick Risk Test: a prospective observational study in Germany. BMJ Open. 2018 Aug 23;8(8):e020847. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2017-020847. Erratum in: BMJ Open. 2018 Oct 18;8(10):e020847corr2. — View Citation

Keller N, Feufel MA, Kendel F, Spies CD, Gigerenzer G. Training medical students how to extract, assess and communicate evidence from an article. Med Educ. 2017 Nov;51(11):1162-1163. doi: 10.1111/medu.13444. Epub 2017 Sep 7. — View Citation

Lindskog M, Kerimi N, Winman A, Juslin P. A Swedish validation of the Berlin Numeracy Test. Scand J Psychol. 2015 Apr;56(2):132-9. doi: 10.1111/sjop.12189. Epub 2015 Jan 8. — View Citation

Wegwarth O, Wagner GG, Gigerenzer G. Can facts trump unconditional trust? Evidence-based information halves the influence of physicians' non-evidence-based cancer screening recommendations. PLoS One. 2017 Aug 23;12(8):e0183024. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0183024. eCollection 2017. — View Citation

Outcome

Type	Measure	Description	Time frame	Safety issue
Primary	Quantitative measurement of "medical risk literacy"	Quantitative measurement of "medical risk literacy" among Portuguese medical and dentistry students measured with the Quick Risk Test (QRT) [Jenny, Keller & Gigerenzer, 2018] and the multiple choice version of the Berlin Numeracy Test (BNT) [Cokely & Galesic, 2012].	1st - 30st of May 2020
Secondary	Impact of study year, faculty, and prior statistical education on the level of risk literacy	Secondary outcomes is to investigate, whether study year, faculty, and prior statistical education have an impact on the level of risk literacy.	1st - 30st of May 2020

External Links

•   Harding Center for Risk Literacy