Iranian Journal of Medical Education

Introduction: Entrepreneurs are the driving force behind the progress and economic growth of a society. The first step in developing entrepreneurship in universities is planning and performing an entrepreneurship need assessment. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to perform a need assessment of the course “entrepreneurship and familiarization with business”.

Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional research consisted of three parts. The first part; reviewing the literature and the topics of the entrepreneurship course in universities; the second part consisted of interviews with entrepreneurship experts and preparing a list of educational needs in terms of knowledge, skill and attitude in the form of a questionnaire; and in the third part, the Delphi technique and a survey of experts’ opinions were carried out to confirm the needs. Data were analyzed by means of descriptive statistics.

Results: Forty-nine educational topics as and 79 competences were found in the first and the second parts respectively. The third part including the Delphi technique led to 35 educational needs in three areas of knowledge (24), skills (6) and attitudes (5).

Conclusion: Given the educational needs of the entrepreneurship course, it is suggested that the curriculum of the course “entrepreneurship and familiarization with business” in medical universities should be planned according to these needs, thereby taking an effective step toward promoting the economy and empowering the graduates.