•The current cohort of veterinary and medical students is comprised of the ‘net generation’ who have grown up with the internet and ever more accessible computer technology.

•Game-based learning and computer-assisted learning have demonstrated value in education at a variety of levels, including medical and veterinary education.

•The widespread and growing availability of mobile devices makes them an ideal platform for delivery of these teaching modalities.

•Game-based mobile applications have not been extensively studied in human or veterinary medical education.

•Our pilot survey looked at the attitudes of students enrolled in medical and veterinary programs regarding their experience and attitudes toward video games in general and toward prototypes of game-based mobile device applications designed for medical curricula.

•The applications in question were specifically designed to align with the curricula of the students’ specific educational programs covering a variety of topics such as histology, anatomy, clinical case management, and anesthesia.

•Students were allowed to interact with these applications freely without restrictions.

•The applications are designed to be intuitive to use so students were not given specific instruction other than what was built into the applications themselves, members of the research team were available to answer questions and provide assistance as needed.  The number of times assistance was required was recorded.

•Students were surveyed regarding their personal use of mobile device games before and during professional school, the types of games played or their reasons for not playing them, and their perceived level of skill with such games.

•Students were also asked about their opinion of the medical educational apps including how helpful they felt the apps would be to their education, how satisfied they were with the experience and willingness to use the apps.

•The vast majority (114/122, 93.4%) of students had prior experience with playing various types of video games.  The general trend of game-playing on mobile devices declined over time from high-school through to professional school and ‘lack of time’ was cited as a reason for not playing games, with increasing frequency from pre-high school (8/30, 26.7%) through to veterinary/medical school (33/55, 60%).

•Students had very little difficulty using the apps, no assistance was required for the majority (84/120, 70%) and most of those that did request assistance needed it only once or twice (30/120, 25%).

•The majority of students thought that the game-based apps would be somewhat (65/120, 54.2%) to very (51/119, 42.8%) helpful if included as part of their curriculum.

•The majority of students were somewhat (65/120, 54.2%) to very (39/120, 32.5%) satisfied with their experience playing the demonstration apps and reported that they would be willing to use the applications (116/120, 96.7%). 

The results of our study demonstrate that students currently enrolled in medical and veterinary programs often have prior experience with gaming on mobile devices, demonstrate ease of use with novel learning apps on these devices and are positive about the use of similar apps in their educational curricula.

•Game-based applications for mobile devices are perfectly situated to take advantage of the principles of game-based learning to provide a student-centered experience that encourages active learning and increases time on task engaged in determined practice. 

•Mobile devices are more and more ubiquitous as the cost of technology decreases, failure to harness the teaching potential of these devices may not only be a wasted opportunity but also could allows or the development of a negative hidden curriculum surrounding their use.

•Medical and veterinary students appear to be positive about the use of game-based educational applications for mobile devices as part of their curriculum.  As mobile devices become more ubiquitous and both game-based and computer-assisted teaching methods used more extensively in early educational programs and high school, students may come to expect their use in professional school.

Though there are both theoretical pedogic advantages and demonstrated interest and acceptance for educational applications for mobile devices, further research is needed to determine the impact of these apps on student outcomes in human and veterinary medical education specifically.