The cost of problem-based vs traditional medical education.

It is generally accepted that teachers' salaries are a major factor in the cost of medical education. Little is known about the effects of curriculum on teaching time. A comparison of teaching time devoted to each of two different medical education curricula is presented. In a traditional teacher-centered, subject-oriented curriculum, 61% of the total teaching effort expended by twenty-two teachers took place in the absence of students, i.e. in preparation for student contact. Only 39% of the effort devoted by these teachers to medical education took place in the presence of students. In a problem-based, student-centered curriculum which focuses upon small-group tutorial learning and early extended primary care experience in a rural community setting, 72% of the total teaching effort devoted to medical education was spent with students and only 28% was spent in preparation for student contact. Overall, there were no differences in the total amount of teaching time required by each of the two curricular approaches to medical education. There were, however, major differences in how teachers spent their teaching time.