Rodríguez, GemmaPérez, NoraNúñez, GemmaBaños i Díez, Josep EladiCarrió, Mar2019-05-292019-05-292019Rodríguez G, Pérez N, Núñez G, Baños JE, Carrió M. Developing creative and research skills through an open and interprofessional inquiry-based learning course. BMC Med Educ. 2019;19(1):134. DOI 10.1186/s12909-019-1563-51472-6920http://hdl.handle.net/10230/41651Background: Biomedicine needs innovative professionals. Inquiry-based learning (IBL) aims to develop higher order thinking skills, such as creativity and research. Stimulatory techniques and interprofessional education, which requires students from different fields to collaborate, also enhances creativity. In this study, the effectiveness of an interprofessional IBL course that introduces a creativity workshop based on stimulatory techniques to develop creative and research skills is examined. Methods: 529 undergraduate human biology and medical students performed the interprofessional IBL course, 198 with the creativity workshop and 331 without. Students’ perceptions of learning processes and outcomes were assessed in surveys and focus groups by the authors of this study. As well, the final learning results from both groups of students were analyzed by the teachers of the course and the researchers. Results: The results show that the open IBL approach promoted the development of these skills, interprofessionality acted as a creativity enhancer and stimulatory techniques contributed to improve the learning outcomes. Conclusions: This study provides insight into how open interprofessional IBL fosters acquisition of complex skills and knowledge, pointing out the benefits and limitations of this approach in health sciences studies.application/pdfeng© The Author(s). 2019 Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. 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.info:eu-repo/semantics/articlehttp://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12909-019-1563-5Research skillsInquiry-based learningCreative thinkingActive learningHigher order skillsinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess