Ten considerations for implementing effective and sustainable near-peer teaching in clinical anatomy education

MedEdPublish (2016). 2017 May 26:6:87. doi: 10.15694/mep.2017.000087. eCollection 2017.

Abstract

This article was migrated. The article was marked as recommended. Near-peer teaching (NPT) is becoming increasing popular in medical education. The rationale and benefits of introducing such programs have been well documented and are usually described in terms of their advantages to the teacher, students and faculty. As a team that have successfully introduced two NPT anatomy programs in the last six years at the University of Southampton, we have taken a largely evidenced based approach in offering 10 considerations to ensure the implementation of a sustainable and effective NPT program in anatomical sciences. We have highlighted important aspects of NPT that will help maximise the benefit of such programs and emphasised particular areas where careful thought is necessary. We conclude that to safeguard sustainability and consistency of any given NPT program, faculty and student partnership is required, as is the maintenance of quality control and evaluative techniques.

Keywords: Anatomy; Anatomy Education; Medical Education; Near-Peer Teaching; Peer Teaching.