Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2020 Aug 5:9:159.
doi: 10.15694/mep.2020.000159.1. eCollection 2020.

The impact of COVID-19 on Medical education and Medical Students. How and when can they return to placements?

Colin Macdougall  1 , Peter Dangerfield  2 , David Katz  3 , W David Strain  4
Affiliations

The impact of COVID-19 on Medical education and Medical Students. How and when can they return to placements?

Colin Macdougall et al. MedEdPublish (2016). .

Abstract

This article was migrated. The article was marked as recommended. The defining feature of 2020 will be the early and mid-stages of the covid-19 pandemic, declared by the World Health Organisation on 11 th March. Rapid worldwide exponential spread continues and by 15 April, more than 1 900 000 cases and 123 000 deaths had been reported worldwide (WHO, 2020). Health services have coped to varying degrees. One common feature has been the withdrawal of routine care (Iacobucci, 2020a) and 'non-essential' staff including learners, although many have returned to undertake care roles. As the likely timeframe for stabilisation of health services becomes clearer, certainly in the United Kingdom (UK) (Iacobucci, 2020b), medical educators need to rapidly get the teaching of the next generation of health care workers back on track if they are to enter health services as confident and competent practitioners in 2020 and 2021. Although a 'whole world' experience, the effects of covid-19 sit in national contexts. We detail the issues for the UK in re-starting and re-inventing medical education, noting that the principles, if not necessarily the detail, will be common across the world.

Keywords: Clerkships; Clinical teaching; Covid-19; Health and Safety; Medical student; Placement learning.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. Acton R. D. Chipman J. G. Lunden M. and Schmitz C. C.(2015) Unanticipated teaching demands rise with simulation training: strategies for managing faculty workload. J Surg Educ. 72(3), pp.522–529. 10.1016/j.jsurg.2014.10.013 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Ali S.(2020) I sat an open book medical school final exam from my bedroom. Available at: https://wwwf.imperial.ac.uk/blog/imperial-medicine/2020/03/25/i-sat-an-o...( Accessed: 25th March 2020).
    1. Amison R.(2020) Early provisional registration for final year medical students. UK General Medical Council.
    1. Aretz H. and Armstrong E.(2013) Undergraduate medical education.in Walsh K.(ed.) Oxford textbook of medical education.pp.326–339.
    1. Atherton J. Reed M. and Petty-Saphon K.(2020) Advice from Medical Schools Council to UK Medical Schools on actions surrounding Covid-19. Medical Schools Council.