A Survey On Tehran University Of Medical Sciences Students’ Familiarity With Personal Information Management

Background and Aim: Personal Information Management (PIM) is a novel approach comprising three interactive parts of information resources, dimensions, and tools. The main aim of this study was to determine the degree of Tehran University of Medical Sciences (TUMS) management and information science students’ familiarity with PIM process. Materials and Methods: The present work is a qualitative-applied study and the population includes 145 TUMS management and medical information students in 2012. The subjects were randomly selected and the data were finally obtained from 73 persons through semi-structured interviews. The data collection tool was a questionnaire with 10 open-ended questions classified based on the conceptual framework of interviews. The questions were about how to acquire, organize, maintain, and retrieve information. To analyse the interviews, the qualititative data analysis software Nvivo 8 was employed. Results: According to the obtained results, 51% (37 persons) of interviewed persons have applied methods and tools in order to organize and maintain information and have had exclusive methods to retrieve information. The most frequent worries were the information storage 49% (35 persons) and acquiring information 29% (21 persons). Conclusion: It is noteworthy to say that the PIM approach is not very popular among university students, and many of them acquire, maintain, and organize their personal information inappropriately in spite of their need for the method. Therefore, educating the students and promoting their performance can result in the improvement of main PIM-related problems.