Correlation between academic achievements in preclinical and clinical courses

Objective: To examine the correlation between academic achievements in preclinical and clinical courses among dental students of Khon Kaen University, Khon Kaen, Thailand. Methods: Data were collected retrospectively from school records of 310 dental graduates between 2000 and 2005. The samples were categorized into 2 groups: Group I (236 students who successfully passed the examination in all 99 courses) and Group II (74 students who had failed the examination in any of the courses). Student's academic achievement was measured by letter grade of the 99 courses in seven clinical subject areas including operative dentistry, oral surgery, prosthodontics, periodontics, oral diagnosis, pedodontics and orthodontics. Lecture, laboratory and clinical courses within each subject area were identified. Correlations between academic achievements in lecture and laboratory, lecture and clinical, and laboratory and clinical courses were analyzed using Spearman's rank correlation. Results: Student performance in pre-clinical courses was correlated positively and moderately with the performance in clinical courses for most subject areas (r ranges 0.33-0.55 in Group I, and 0.29-0.52 in Group II, P<0.01). The lowest correlation was observed for performances in pedodontics lecture and clinical courses (r= 0.38 and 0.29 in Group I and II, respectively, p<0.01). The correlation of performances in pedodontics laboratory and clinical courses (r=0.33 and 0.43 in Group I and II, respectively, p<0.01) was also lower as compared with other subject areas. Performances in oral diagnosis lecture and clinical courses were correlated well (r≥0.50). Conclusion: There are low to moderate correlations between academic achievements in preclinical and clinical dentistry courses.