Undergraduate medical education is unlike other taught undergraduate courses at universities. Whilst other science courses such as mathematics, engineering or biology can rely on traditional face-to-face teaching for most of content delivery, undergraduate medical education sees a transition from pre-clinical teaching to clinical learning half-way during the course. Students are suddenly dispersed over a large geographical area in the various hospitals affiliated with the universities making the delivery of content a challenge.

We aimed to identify whether these structural differences between the preclinical and clinical years are reflected in the amount of direct teaching and e-learning modules received by medical students. We measure and analyse the number of hours of direct, face-to-face teaching students receive during a five-year undergraduate medicine course and discuss the technological implications for the future provision of medical education.

We analysed the full content delivery over the five-year undergraduate MBBS programme (2012) at a traditional medical school in the UK. Teaching takes place in lectures, small groups, the anatomy theatre, at the bedside and via online lectures (e-modules). We calculated the total direct teaching hours over the programme from student self-reported experience, staff interviews and analysis of timetables. We also measured and analysed the number of e-modules available to students over the same time period.

There is a reduction by 45% of direct teaching received as students progress from pre-clinical through to clinical years. In addition, there is a rise by 730% of the number of e-modules available during this transition. 

There are numerous factors that affect content delivery including geographical placement of students, a change in students' learning requirements and additional student factors. 

These factors provide implications for institutions supplying medical education. There must remain innovation in content delivery and schools must embrace emerging technologies to add to the consistency of the student experience and to reduce the uncertainty of the hospital learning environment. Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) in the USA have achieved increased accessibility whilst saving on cost. The increase in e-learning resolves issues encountered by dispersed geography and provides freedom to focus on the clinical experience.