An Interuniversity Competition for Medical Students to Learn Radiology in the Second Life Metaverse

Abstract

Purpose: The aim of this study was to evaluate an interuniversity competition online to learn radiology held in a 3-D virtual world, the Second Life metaverse, by analyzing the results of the game and students’ perceptions. Methods: Medical students voluntarily participated in teams of four, for 6 weeks, successively covering radiologic anatomy and radiologic semiology of the chest, abdomen, and musculoskeletal. Each week, participants had 4.5 days to study self-learning pre-sentations and 2.5 days to complete an individual multiple-choice test and a team task, the results of which determined the game’s ranking. Participants were asked to complete a cognitive-load test, a perception questionnaire, and a postexposure knowledge test. Results: The competition was repeated for 2 years (editions), in 2020 and 2021. Seventy-five of 102 teams (73.5%) registered completed the game; 76% of them included third-year students. The average percentage of correct answers in the individual tests and team tasks was 74.2 +/- 15.1 and 71.6 +/- 14.7 respectively, without significant differences between both competitions. In general, the experience was valued positively (scores >8 on a 10-point scale). A lower perception score was found in 2021 among students from universities other than the organizing university, showing a positive correlation with the in-game score. Conclusions: An interuniversity competition in the Second Life metaverse for undergraduate learning radiology is feasible and reproducible. Participating medical students considered it interesting and useful and also identified this activity during the 2 years of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic as a playful learning and social interaction experience.