Using team-based learning to teach pharmacology to second year medical students improves student performance

Background: Team-based learning (TBL) is an innovative instructional method that fosters active learning. It has been shown to improve student performance in some health care education courses. Aim: To examine the effect of teaching pharmacology using a TBL approach on second year medical students’ satisfaction and performance. Methods: A modified TBL method was used in two case-based discussion sessions of the second year pharmacology course: a relatively easy drug metabolism/pharmacogenetics session and a more challenging pharmacokinetics/pharmacodynamics (PK/PD) session. Individual and group answers to all questions were recorded, and an evaluation form was collected for each session. Class performance on a summative quiz was compared to previous years. Results: Students provided positive feedback. Group performance was better than individual performance during the TBL exercises. TBL was less successful when the questions were very difficult, with a difficulty range of 30–70% being the most appropriate. Performance of the class on the pharmacology summative quiz showed significant improvement over that in previous years in the PK/PD part, but was unchanged in other topics taught traditionally. Conclusion: The results suggest that TBL provides a better outcome for students, and provide insight into appropriate design of TBL exercises.