PRP078: Educators’ experience during the COVID Pandemic with virtual medical student rounds on an inpatient Family Medicine Service
Munima Nasir, MD; Eric Messner, PhD, FNP-BC; Michael Partin, MD; Christopher Davis, MD, MPH
Abstract
The pandemic of COVID-19 has created many challenges for academic medicine, including the education of medical students who have been removed from face-to-face clinical rotations. HIPPA compliant Zoom sessions and iPads are part of the innovative methods being used to resume real patient contact for students via virtual rounding. This new use of technology has brought students back onto the Family Medicine (FM) inpatient team, but has also created difficulties for educators as they adapt to these new methods. Objective: The goal is to better understand the challenges faced by educators on an inpatient Family Medicine team as they interface with students over a virtual platform. We hope to continually refine the experience for both educators and students, to make the most efficient use of time and to maximize the educational content of the virtual rounds. Study Design: Mixed methods. Setting: Suburban university-based academic medical center. Population: Teaching staff and clinicians on an inpatient Family Medicine Team. Intervention: Brief surveys with both Likert-style and open ended questions are being used to elicit quantitative data and qualitative responses. Outcome measures: From the quantitative data we hope to ascertain if the current method for conducting virtual rounds can be improved, including enhanced interactions between students and educators. From the qualitative questions it is expected that themes will emerge regarding how educators reacted to the virtual rounds. Specific questions will ask what educators found to be most effective for conducting virtual rounds, and what clinical content was considered most important for students to take away from the clinical encounter. Results: Several methods and platforms were piloted to reintroduce medical students to clinical care with live patients. Zoom sessions and iPads were found to be the most efficient for virtual rounding with the inpatient FM team. The providers and educators on the FM inpatient team gave positive feedback and felt the level of interaction and education was good. Now that the implementation of the virtual platform has been standardized and students begin virtual clinical rotations, it is expected that results from the surveys will continue to guide and enhance educator and student interactions.
Megan Mendez Miller
mmendezmiller@pennstatehealth.psu.edu 11/21/2020As a faculty member, I thoroughly enjoyed the virtual rounding at our institution and appreciate the assessment for the students regarding perceived educational benefit. Thank you for presenting this work