Interest Groups as an Alternative for Medical Education in Sleep Medicine: Experience Report at a Brazilian Medical School

Sleep medicine classes and teachings are usually deficient and insufficient during undergraduate medical education. In order to circumvent the educational deficits in sleep medicine, students at a Brazilian Medical School created a sleep medicine interest group-an academic organization for teaching purposes whose administration is carried out by the undergraduate students themselves. This study aims to describe the establishment of a sleep medicine interest group, as well as to evaluate the results of its first edition on the knowledge about sleep medicine among undergraduate medical students. Classes were taken biweekly and consisted of lectures by invited professors, presentation of clinical cases, and discussion with the students. By the end of the course, both attendees and non-attendees were invited to fill out a questionnaire including an objective assessment of knowledge (15 multiple choice questions). The questionnaire was filled out by 32 participants, of which 18 were attendees and 14 were non-attendees. The average result on the final exam was significantly higher among the attendees (6.1 +/- 1.2) in comparison with non-attendees (4.9 +/- 1.3-p = 0.015). The results demonstrate that an interest group proved to be feasible as a source of complementary information to undergraduate medical students and a valid alternative to circumvent the educational deficits.