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Effect of a Community Service-Learning Intervention on Medical Empathy and Clinical Self-Efficacy in Medical Students

NCT07528521 · Status: COMPLETED · Phase: NA · Type: INTERVENTIONAL · Enrollment: 35

Last updated 2026-08-17

Study results available
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Summary

Medical empathy and clinical self-efficacy are key professional competencies that are difficult to develop through traditional classroom-based training alone. At the Faculty of Medicine of FES Iztacala (UNAM), the curriculum includes a community practice component in the Practica Clinica I module that is rarely implemented in practice, creating a gap between the formal and real curriculum.

This quasi-experimental pre-post study evaluates the effect of a structured Service-Learning (SL) intervention - a community anthropometry and somatometry assessment session conducted at a primary school - on medical empathy, perceived clinical self-efficacy, and clinical report performance in 35 fourth-semester medical students.

Medical empathy will be measured using the Jefferson Scale of Empathy, Student version (JSE-S), validated in Spanish for Latin American populations. Clinical self-efficacy will be measured using the Medical Self-Efficacy Scale (EAM), a 5-item Likert instrument developed by the principal investigator (Cronbach's alpha=0.818, McDonald's omega=0.862). Clinical performance will be assessed using a standardized 33-point rubric evaluated blindly by two independent faculty members, with inter-rater reliability calculated using the Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC).

Children participating in the community session will receive a personalized health report with their anthropometric results and, if clinically relevant findings are detected, will be referred to the University Health Clinic (CUSI) at FES Iztacala at no cost.

Conditions

  • Medical Education

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Community Service-Learning Anthropometric Assessment

A single-session community Service-Learning activity conducted at Escuela Primaria Jesus Garcia (C.T. 15DPR1779L). Medical students perform weight, height, BMI, body circumferences (waist, hip, arm), body segments, and waist-hip ratio measurements on consenting school children. Students complete a simplified clinical history form and produce a written clinical report including anthropometric data, interpretation using WHO/CDC reference tables, relevant findings, and health recommendations. Each participating child's family receives a sealed personalized results envelope. Students with clinically significant findings are referred to CUSI (FES Iztacala). Duration: one full day. Supervised by faculty members from FES Iztacala.

Sponsors & Collaborators

  • Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico

    collaborator OTHER

  • Luis Angel Flores Sagrero

    lead OTHER

Study Design

Allocation
NA
Purpose
OTHER
Masking
NONE
Model
SINGLE_GROUP

Eligibility

Min Age
18 Years
Sex
ALL
Healthy Volunteers
Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start
2026-04-08
Primary Completion
2026-05-13
Completion
2026-05-27

Countries

  • Mexico

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Read the full study record

This page highlights key information. For complete eligibility criteria, study locations, investigator contacts, and the full protocol, visit the original record on ClinicalTrials.gov.

View NCT07528521 on ClinicalTrials.gov