Zaghal, A.Marley, C.Rahhal, S.Hassanieh, J.Saadeh, R.El-Rifai, A.Qaraqe, T.ElBejjani, M.Jaafar, R.Hoballah, J.J.2025-07-172025-07-172022BMC Medical Education, 2022; 22(1):290-1-290-181472-69201472-6920https://hdl.handle.net/2440/146109Background and aim: Traditionally, practical skills are taught on face-to-face (F-F) basis. COVID-19 pandemic brought distance learning (DL) to the spotlight because of the social distancing mandates. We sought to determine the acceptability and effectiveness of DL of basic suturing in novice learners. Methods: A prospective randomized controlled trial involving 118 students was conducted. Participants were randomized into two groups for learning simple interrupted suturing: F-F and DL-groups. Evaluation was conducted by two assessors using a performance checklist and a global rating tool. Agreement between the assessors was calculated, and performance scores of the participants were compared. Participants’ satisfaction was assessed via a questionnaire. Results: Fifty-nine students were randomized to the F-F group and 59 to the DL-group. Satisfactory agreement between the assessors was demonstrated. All participants were successful in placing three interrupted sutures, with no significant difference in the performance between the groups. 25(44.6%) of the respondents in the DL-group provided negative comments related to the difficulties of remotely learning visuospatial concepts, 16(28.5%) preferred the F-F approach. Conclusion: DL of basic suturing is as effective as the F-F approach in novice learners. It is acceptable by the students despite the challenges related to the remote learning of practical skills.en© The Author(s) 2022. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visithttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.Distance learnin; Face-to-face learning; Medical education; Suturing skills; PandemicHumansSuture TechniquesProspective StudiesSuturesEducation, DistanceClinical CompetenceStudents, MedicalPandemicsCOVID-19Journal article10.1186/s12909-022-03353-32024-08-13609426Marley, C. [0000-0002-5869-0521]