E-Textbook Technologies for Academics in Medical Education

Abstract

Public universities in Poland receive fairly limited financial support for creating e-textbooks (interactive online textbooks) and lack the appropriate ICT competences among teaching staff, especially in the case of non-technical universities. The authors propose a pedagogical and technological paradigm for e-textbooks in medical education using open source software with minimal IT skills required. Technologies used to develop e-textbooks are connected with: publication and distribution of e-textbooks, e-book readers, and editing tools. The paper also discusses a survey that targeted students of medical sciences, which focused on their understanding of their educational needs that can be met through new online resources as well as their expectations of how such e-textbooks should be like.