Clinical trial NCT04380428: Risk Literacy Among Portuguese Medical and Dentistry Students
Official title: Risk Literacy Among Portuguese Medical and Dentistry Students - a Cohort Study
Study type: OBSERVATIONAL
Overall status: COMPLETED
Conditions: Medical Education
Decision Support Techniques
Keywords: medical education
risk literacy
risk savvy
statistics
risk communication
probabilistic data
heuristics
students
Lead sponsor: Harding Center for Risk Literacy
Sponsor class: OTHER
First posted: 2020-05-08
Enrollment: 950
Sex: ALL
Minimum age (years): 18
Maximum age (years): 65
Standard ages: ADULT
OLDER_ADULT
Accepts healthy volunteers: yes
Observational model: COHORT
Time perspective: CROSS_SECTIONAL
Sampling method: NON_PROBABILITY_SAMPLE
Study population: All matriculated students at Portuguese medical and dental faculties will be invited to participate (participation of faculties to be confirmed).

Brief 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).

Detailed 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.

Eligibility criteria: 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

Primary outcomes:
measure: Quantitative measurement of "medical risk literacy"
timeFrame: 1st - 30st of May 2020
Secondary outcomes:
measure: Impact of study year, faculty, and prior statistical education on the level of risk literacy
timeFrame: 1st - 30st of May 2020
Other outcomes:
Locations:
city: Potsdam
country: Germany
facility: Harding Center for Risk Literacy
state: Brandenburg
Study officials:
affiliation: Harding Center, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany
name: Niklas Keller, Dr. rer. nat
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
affiliation: Harding Center for Risk Literacy, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany
name: Alexej Zhogov
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
affiliation: Harding Center for Risk Literacy, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany
name: Maxim Benz
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
affiliation: Presidency of the Portuguese Republic, Portugal
name: Mário Pereira Pinto, Dr.
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
affiliation: Faculty of Medicine of the University of Coimbra, Portugal
name: Henrique Proença da Cunha, Dr.
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
affiliation: Harding Center for Risk Literacy
name: Gerd Gigerenzer, Prof.
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
affiliation: Harding Center for Risk Literacy
name: Miriam Jenny, Dr.
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
References:
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.
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. No abstract available.
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.
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.
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. doi: 10.5209/rev_sjop.2011.v14.n1.19.
citation: Gigerenzer G, Wegwarth O. Five year survival rates can mislead. BMJ. 2013 Jan 29;346:f548. doi: 10.1136/bmj.f548. No abstract available.
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. No abstract available.
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.
citation: 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.
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. No abstract available.