The Relationship Between Admission Channels and Medical Students' Performance in Their Third Year

Purpose: The literature shows that medical students who have a low interest in a medical career usually demonstrate problematic learning outcomes. Since 2010, in addition to the traditional exam-based admission, the authorities in Taiwan have provided two new admission channels to a college education: individual applications and the ＂Multi- Stars Recommendation Project.＂ This study attempted to examine whether the Multi- Stars-recommended medical students would have better academic scores, extracurricular participation, devotion to a medical career, and satisfactory time management in their third year of college. Methods: Participants included 147 medical students from a university in northern Taiwan. The collected data included admission channels, academic scores, extracurricular performances, devotion to a medical career, satisfaction with time management, and anxiety. Results: Results showed a trend of Multi-Stars-recommended students performing the best in terms of academic, extracurricular performances, devotion to a medical career, satisfaction with time management, followed by students who individually applied, with the worst performance by students admitted on an exam basis. Post-hoc analyses showed that Multi-Stars-recommended students performed better than did students admitted on an exam basis. Conclusion: The Multi-Stars recommendation project was designed to admit multidimensional students, and this study demonstrated its value in matching students' personal interests with medical programs. It is suggested that medical schools should recruit high school students who are truly interested in becoming medical doctors, so that they will perform better in medical school. Further studies are needed to evaluate students' actual performances as medical practitioners in the future.