| Summary: | Faisal Alsaif,1 Lina Neel,2 Saleh Almuaiqel,1 Abdulaziz Almuhanna,1 Jude Feda,3 Nouf Alrumaihi,4 Omar Alanazi,3 Mohammed Almansour,3 Majda Fuad Saeed,3 Mona Soliman3 1College of Medicine, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; 2College of Medicine, Alfaisal University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; 3Medical Education Department, College of Medicine, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; 4Saudi Commission of Health Specialties, College of Medicine, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi ArabiaCorrespondence: Mona Soliman, Head of Medical Education Department, Professor of Medical Education and Physiology, College of Medicine, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Tel +966505468581, Email msoliman1@ksu.edu.saBackground: COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a sudden shift to online education. PBL was one of the components that was transformed to online. The aim of the present study was to investigate the impact of the sudden shift to virtual PBL during COVID-19 pandemic in achieving the intended learning objectives of the PBL and to explore the students’ perception of the virtual versus traditional PBL.Methods: This is a retrospective study that was conducted in the college of medicine, King Saud University. We compared the perception of third year students who participated in traditional face-to-face PBL in 2019– 2020 and in the virtual PBL in 2020– 2021. We compared the performance of the students in the traditional face-to-face and in virtual PBL. An online survey was distributed from October to December 2021. The survey contained 7 sections. Each section included several questions comparing virtual and traditional PBL in that aspect.Results: Out of 284 third year medical students, 124 students responded with a response rate of 43.66%. More than half of the students (n = 77, 63%) felt significantly motivated to actively participate in PBL sessions in a virtual learning environment, motivated to learn and support group work and gained critical thinking skills (mean = 3.54 ± 0.12 versus 3.59 ± 0.14, p < 0.001). The majority of students (n = 82, 66%) felt significantly more satisfied about their learning during the virtual PBL versus traditional PBL (mean = 3.48 ± 0.42 versus 3.91 ± 0.59, p < 0.001). There was no significant difference in the students’ performance in traditional versus virtual PBL (mean = 4.77 ± 0.22 versus 4.79 ± 0.29, p = 0.2).Conclusion: The results of this study showed that students were significantly more satisfied with the experience in the virtual versus traditional PBL. Medical students’ performances in virtual PBL were comparable to the traditional face-to-face approach.Keywords: COVID-19, problem-based learning, PBL, traditional, virtual, learning, medical students
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