does emergency medicine clerkship change students’ misconceptions towards this specialty? pre- and postclerkship perceptions

Objective: this study aims to understand students’ skills based on their self-assessment and their perceptions regarding emergency medicine (em) physicians, em patients, and choosing emas a future career. methods: this study employed prospective observational design. it was conducted from 2 october to 2 november 2022 in saudi arabia. the study participants were senior medical students at king faisal university. senior students who finished a four-week em rotation were involved as post-cases, and senior students who had not finished their em rotation were involved as pre-cases. an online survey was administrated to all students who met out criteria. results: a total of 161 students were included in the study; 65.2% had not yet done their em clerkship, while 34.8% had completed their em clerkship. among them, 48.4% were male, and 51.6% were female. on average, post-em clerkship students showed greater confidence in their skills of conducting an initial assessment of a patient (p=0.027), developing a management plan (p=0.007), explaining the principles of em to others (p<0.001), presenting patient cases formally (p=0.049), interpreting electrocardiogram (p=0.006), and applying medical resuscitation (p=0.041). no significant differences were found between the average confidence in the skills and abilities of male and female students. post-em clerkship and male students were more likely to choose em as a career when compared with pre-emclerkship (p<0.001) and female students (p=0.006). conclusion: it seems that, after completing a four-week rotation, students exhibited significant advances in knowledge, illness management, and procedural skills. it is likely that the em clerkship significantly improved students’ perceptions of the emspecialty.