4. Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) - Faculties submissions

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    Development of an interprofessional education and collaborative practice curriculum for health science students at Sefako Makgatho Health Sciences University
    (University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-09) Pitout, Susara Johanna Susanna; Barnard-Ashton, Paula; Adams, Fasloen; du Toit, Sanetta Henrietta Johanna
    A South African university required a contextually relevant, Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice (IPECP) curriculum. The study aimed to develop and validate an IPECP curriculum for health sciences students at Sefako Makgatho Health Sciences University (SMU). Planning the IPECP curriculum necessitated both a robust theoretical foundation and pragmatic problem-solving and comprised three phases. Phase I, the situational analysis included a scoping review of global peer-reviewed literature, focus groups with students and lecturers, and a university-wide needs survey. Brookfield’s lenses of critical reflection and reflexivity condensed results of the situational analysis into factors guiding curriculum planning. Phase II included a curriculum map analysis of profession-specific curricula of the eleven professions: occupational therapy, physiotherapy, speech language pathology and audiology, human nutrition and dietetics, nursing, medicine, radiography, pharmacy, dentistry, dental therapy, and oral hygiene. The curriculum mapping involved consultation with professions’ representatives in combination with information extracted from LOOOP, an electronic curriculum mapping programme. The analysis identified the gaps in addressing interprofessional collaboration core-competencies and highlighted common topics, in the professions’ specific curricula. From the curriculum foundation laid by Phase I and II, an IPECP curriculum framework and design principles were conceptualised using a Curriculum Development Research design. In Phase III, the proposed SMU-IPECP curriculum and accompanying design principles were refined during iterative stages of design, development, testing and revision. Internal and external participants validated the curriculum by rating the relevance, consistency, practicality, and feasibility of the four-year, longitudinal curriculum. A modified Delphi guided consensus on the design principles. The curriculum escalated interprofessional role development from mere exposure to immersion, striving for competent representation in research, ethics and Primary Health care. The build-up followed a trajectory from a professional individualised role in the team, to students fulfilling a dual identity of professional and an interprofessional practice-ready practitioner, who practices in an evidence-based collaborative way as a primary health care advocate, in their final year. The curriculum validation highlighted affordances and constraints for future implementation. During validation, participants agreed on the design and commended the proposed IPECP curriculum. Although the curriculum was planned for a specific university, the theoretical design principles developed through this research process could potentially be customised to fit similar university contexts.
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    The prevalence of malocclusion and orthodontic treatment needs of patients treated by students at Wits Oral Health Centre
    (2024) Rawat, Ameera
    Objectives: To assess the prevalence of malocclusion and orthodontic treatment needs of patients treated by undergraduate students at Wits Oral Health Centre. Materials and Methods: 124 pre-treatment orthodontic study models were reviewed. The Angle’s classification was used to classify malocclusion and the Dental Aesthetic Index (DAI) scores categorised the severity of malocclusion and orthodontic treatment needs. The prevalence of malocclusion was determined by the percentage of patients in the sample who were categorised by DAI as definitive, severe and handicapping malocclusion. Stata version 16 was used to analyse the data and statistical tests were conducted at 5% significance level. Results: The prevalence of malocclusion was estimated to be 92.74%. The mean DAI score was 39.54, ranging from 23 to 94. Handicapping malocclusion requiring mandatory treatment presented in 60.48% of the sample. Severe and definite malocclusion presented in 19.35% and 12.9% of the sample respectively, indicating a need for treatment. Minor malocclusion requiring minimal or no orthodontic treatment was in 7.26%. Angle’s classification showed that most of the study sample (n=101; 81.45%) had a Class I malocclusion, followed by Class III (n=12; 9.68%) and Class II (n=11; 8.87%). There were no statistically significant differences between the DAI scores and the Angle’s classification of malocclusion, p=0.9. Conclusion: Angle’s classification and the DAI scores showed that all patients in the study sample presented with malocclusion. However, 92.74% of the sample was deemed requiring orthodontic treatment by the DAI.
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    Exploring the students’ perceptions of factors that enable or constrain the learning of neurophysiology at a South African metropolitan university: a qualitative study
    (2024) Nyakudya, Trevor Tapiwa
    Some undergraduate medical and biomedical students grasp neurophysiology easily while others struggle to understand neurophysiology, suggesting that that there are factors that enhance or constrain epistemic access to neurophysiology. Students that struggle with neurophysiology concepts often fail to progress in terms of knowledge building and find it difficult to integrate and associate the control of other systems by the nervous system. The aim of this study was to explore and describe the undergraduate biomedical students’ perceptions of factors that enhance or constrain the learning of neurophysiology at a metropolitan university in South Africa. This was a qualitative descriptive study in which a general thematic analysis approach was used. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of 10 male and female undergraduate biomedical students studying Physiology and registered in the Faculty of Health Sciences at a metropolitan university in South Africa. Interview transcripts were coded using MAXQDA for data management and analysed using a general thematic analysis approach. Students’ perceptions of the factors that enhance or constrain the learning of neurophysiology including troublesome knowledge and potential threshold concepts were identified and described. Findings show that students identified prior learning of biological concepts in high school, availability of learning resources and practical sessions as enhancing the learning of neurophysiology while the amount of work to be covered, language and terminology, prerequisite knowledge of physical sciences and the existence of troublesome knowledge and potential threshold concepts were identified as constraining factors in the learning of neurophysiology. Neurophysiology topics such as somatosensory and somatomotor pathways, functions of the different regions of the brain and special senses were recognised as 2 troublesome knowledge while the generation and propagation of action potentials was described as a threshold concept that acted as a barrier to the learning of neurophysiology. We conclude that exploring the students’ perceptions of the factors that enhance or constrain the learning of neurophysiology could improve epistemic access to neurophysiology knowledge. This study suggests how academics can design physiology teaching to support students in the learning of neurophysiology. Thus to improve learning outcomes in neurophysiology, it may be important to address the factors that constrain the learning of neurophysiology. Moreover, provision of targeted support and resources for students to overcome potential barriers to learning may be useful in the teaching of neurophysiology.