• Investigating the effects of using blended learning method on medical students
  • Zahra Khodadoostan,1,* Mahsa khodadoostan,2 Zahra Asadi,3
    1. Student Committee of Medical Education Development, Education Development Center, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran
    2. Student Committee of Medical Education Development, Education Development Center, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
    3. Student Committee of Medical Education Development, Education Development Center, Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, Ahvaz, Iran


  • Introduction: Blended learning is actually a combination of traditional face-to-face education with modern electronic education methods, which has become an effective method in the education of medical students due to the rapid growth in the use of technologies in teaching and learning. For this method, electronic learning is used to complete academic lessons in conjunction with additional workshops to enhance clinical performance. As Internet infrastructure continues to develop, along with students' access to the Internet, the Internet can now be used to supplement traditional and conventional training methods. The purpose of this review is to investigate the effect of using blended learning method on medical students.
  • Methods: A review study was conducted in 2023 with the keywords of “Blended learning”, “Blended learning in medical students”, “Medical Education” and their Persian terms in Google Scholar search engine and Pub Med, Web Of Science, SID databases. The applied restrictions include the time limit of 2023-2018, Farsi and English language studies, descriptive, analytical, interventional and qualitative articles. Books, thesis and review articles were excluded. The articles related to the study were also evaluated through a researcher made evaluating tool. Finally, 14 articles were reviewed from the extracted articles, the articles which full text was available.
  • Results: Based on the studies, the effects of combined learning on students include improving students' learning (4 studies), Participation of learners (1 study), academic progress of students (3 studies), improving thinking and decision-making methods (2 studies), improving the ability to solve problems (3 studies), improving the level of knowledge (3 studies), improving clinical skills (3 studies), improving critical thinking (1 study), improving comprehensive performance in exams (2 studies), facilitating learning and ease of understanding (2 studies), correcting the study method of learners (1 study), increasing students' self-confidence (1 study), improving cognitive ability (1 study), independent and student-centered learning (4 studies), flexible learning time (1 study), improving teacher-student interaction and asking questions more easily (3 studies), Creating interest and motivation in learning (3 studies). Students were in the fields of medicine, dentistry, health, nursing, and master's students in medical sciences.
  • Conclusion: This study shows that blended learning has many positive effects on the learning of medical sciences students. It is effective in improving medical sciences students' learning and this method has positive effects on improving clinical skills and students' motivation. It is suggested to use this method during lectures and clinical courses.
  • Keywords: Medical Education, Blended learning, Learning