Aviad Haramati, PhD , is an award-winning physiologist and medical educator. He is Professor of Integrative Physiology, Founding Director of the Center for Innovation and Leadership in Education (CENTILE), and co-director of the Graduate Program in Integrative Medicine and Health Sciences at Georgetown University Medical Center. He received a PhD in Physiology (University of Cincinnati) and came to Georgetown after 5 years at Mayo Clinic. For over 25 years, his research interests addressed renal and electrolyte homeostasis, but now his focus is on medical education and re-thinking how health professionals are trained. Dr. Haramati has advocated that mindful practices be integrated into the medical curriculum to foster self-awareness, reduce stress and boost resilience and well-being. He has been a visiting professor at over 100 medical schools worldwide.

Georgetown University School of Medicine, Washington, DC, USA

Students as Change Agents in Medical Education and Patient-Centered Care

The notion that medical students should have a voice in improving aspects of their medical training is not new.  However, as schools are confronted with unprecedented challenges to deliver quality medical education in virtual environments, and grappling with the ravages of a global pandemic, having significant input and perspective from trainees is not only advisable, but may be value-added.  Indeed, some would argue that medical students are ideally positioned to be key change agents in medical education, uniquely adaptable to new environments and the digital age.  Evidence is also emerging that student engagement may also be important for advancing patient-centered care, and having patients assume a central role in a system where they are not only individuals who seek optimal health care, but also key players in an educational setting.  This keynote presentation will set the stage for how students might serve as effective change agents in medical education and unique drivers of patient-centered healthcare.

Elizabeth Gaufberg, MD MPH is an Associate Professor of Medicine and Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, Director of Professional and Academic Development at the Cambridge Health Alliance, and a Senior Consultant to the Association of American Medical Colleges Arts and Humanities Initiative. She founded and co-directs the Harvard Macy Institute Art Museum-based Health Professions Education Fellowship. From 2012-2018 Liz served as the Jean and Harvey Picker Founding Director of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation Research Institute during which time she developed a community of practice of researchers, educators and advocates dedicated to advancing humanism in healthcare. For the past 17 years, Liz has led the Harvard Medical School Cambridge Integrated Clerkship Developing Physician Course. Her areas of professional interest include exploring assumptions about teaching and learning, and developing innovative models of medical education, including longitudinal integrated clerkships and humanities and arts-based pedagogy.

The Harvard Medical School Cambridge Integrated Clerkship: transforming medical education for the 21st century

Longitudinal integrated clerkship (LIC) models of clinical medical education are proliferating worldwide.  Three principles define these relationship-centered clinical curricula: medical students participate in the comprehensive care of patients over time; students establish continuing learning relationships with these patients’ clinicians, and students meet the majority of the year’s core clinical competencies across multiple disciplines simultaneously. This keynote presentation will describe a “case for change” for medical education, and describe the model, outcomes and lessons learned from 17 years of experience with the Harvard Medical School Cambridge Integrated Clerkship.

Tim is a medically qualified education researcher who investigates workplace learning, using implementation science to improve doctors’ ability to handle indeterminate, safety-critical situations. He uses various critical, qualitative methodologies to investigate power, inequality, and education for humanistic care. He is Honorary Fellow of the Academy of Medical Educators, received the Association for the Study of Medical Education’s Gold Medal, and has won national awards for innovation in medical education.

Helping clerkship students learn from real patients in practice

My presentation takes it as an axiom that 'you learn the job by doing a job’. I will take a critical position towards the currently dominant opinion (at least in the UK until the pandemic) that 'off-the-job' education can quality-assured graduate doctors as safe to practise. I will elaborate this point by distinguishing between 'competence' and 'capability’, the latter of which provides an adaptable basis for personal growth. Using Activity Theory as a methodological lens, I will show evidence that there is a potentially disabling contradiction between satisfying regulators that students are competent and educating doctors who are capable of providing patient-centred care, in all its complexity. I will show evidence that giving students authentic tasks in practice settings can result in expansive learning. And I will report a 'formative intervention', in which patients with diabetes work interchangeably with doctors, nurses, and pharmacists to provide one-to-one guided reflection and help students develop capabilities for person-centred working. I will show how, far from preventing this pedagogic development, the pandemic catalysed processes of change.

I hope this presentation will encourage my stance: that medical students develop the identities of doctors by supported participation in authentic clinical practice, coupled with guided reflection on 'real patient learning’. In the language of Activity Theory, patients are the object - the motivating force behind - clinical workplace learning.

Christian Scheffer is a specialist in internal medicine with a Master’s in Medical Education. Over the past years, the main aim his professional work has been to find a structured way to promote medical students’ active participation in health care while ensuring that their participation is of benefit to patients. Together with his colleagues Friedrich Edelhäuser and Diethard Tauschel he founded and leads the Integrated curriculum for Anthroposophic Medicine (ICURAM) at Witten / Herdecke University in Germany. 

Students Contribute to Patient Centerdness – Lessons Learned from the Witten Herdecke Clinical Education Ward

This presentation synthetizes experiences and research results about active student participation at Witten Herdecke Clinical Education Wards. Final Year Medical Students take care of patients being closely supervised and having an autonomous role in the team. Students perceive this way of responsibility driven learning as a stressful but critical transformative experience for becoming a physician. Student participation is appreciated by patients as a valuable support to a deeper understanding of their condition and treatment. Based on these experiences the role of the students in our health care system is reflected.

Götz Fabry is an educational researcher at Albert-Ludwigs-University Freiburg in the Department of Medical Psychology and Medical Sociology. He qualified as a physician and holds a Master‘s degree in health professions education from the University of Illinois at Chicago. His main research interest are the prerequisites of successful learning and development in medical education e.g. motivation, learning strategies, epistemological beliefs. Together with Martin Fischer he is editor-in-chief of the GMS Journal for Medical Education.

The meaning of being an active part in the healthcare community

In my talk I will focus on some of the challenges and tensions inherent in clinical teaching and learning. Most importantly, students experience a conflict between being a learner who needs instruction and support on the one hand, and the wish as well as the – presumed or declared –  expectation to contribute to the success of the community of practice they are immersed in on the other hand. With the Covid-19 pandemic this conflict becomes especially prominent: Many medical students volunteer to help clinical teams and many medical schools support this by willingly recognizing credits to these temporary jobs especially since clinical teaching cannot take place as planned. As is true for other clinical placements however, the question whether or not students are really able to utilize these opportunities for their learning and professional development are rather secondary. Thus, in order to optimize learning for medical students when working clinically the respective communities of practice need to embrace learning as one of their core values. Furthermore, reflecting on the different roles and responsibilities of students and teachers needs to be an essential part of the learning process. I will discuss some evidence that we do not always meet these requirements as yet and will outline what might improve the situation.

Dr. Gert Ulrich is researcher at the Careum Foundation (Zurich, Switzerland) in the field of interprofessional education and project manager of the "Zurich Interprofessional Training Ward (ZIPAS)".

The Zurich interprofessional training ward (ZIPAS)

The Swiss healthcare system is facing major challenges. Demographic developments and the increase in chronic diseases are leading to a growing demand for medical services; this is accompanied by increasing complex treatments as well as by a continuous rise in costs. In addition, there is a marked shortage of health and medical professionals, particularly in the field of primary health care, which can only be alleviated by the influx of foreign specialists. Interprofessional collaboration between the professions involved in health care (e.g. doctors, nurses, dietitians, physiotherapists or occupational therapists) is often seen as a way of adressing these challenges. Future healthcare professionals must therefore be equipped with interprofessional skills during their education or training, respectively.

Practice-based interprofessional learning on interprofessional training wards is becoming increasingly important in European German-speaking countries. On IP training wards, students from various health professions are supposed to collaborate and learn together under supervision of experienced facilitators while taking care for real patients. Experiences of German and Swedish interprofessional training wards show that these wards have established themselves as a quality feature of the hospital in terms of better cooperation, high-quality interprofessional training and patient care.

Since May 2017, six institutions located in the Swiss canton of Zurich (University of Zurich, Faculty of Medicine; University Hospital Zurich; Careum Training Centre, Zurich; Careum foundation, Zurich; Zurich University of Applied Sciences, School of Health Professions; Institution for upper-secondary and tertiary education in the health care fields, Canton of Zurich) cooperate to allow future students in medicine, nursing, physiotherapy and occupational therapy to be trained side by side on a training ward.

This talk aims to present insights into the concept and current roll-out efforts on further wards and hospitals for the "Zurich Interprofessional Training Ward" (ZIPAS).

The IPSTA (Interprofessional Training Stations) project of the Federal Representation of Medical Students in Germany (bvmd) has been the only student project in this form to support the nationwide implementation of IPSTAs for the past two years. An IPSTA means a clinical ward where trainees and students of the health professions (including nursing, physiotherapy and medical students) have the opportunity to take on responsibility in the care of patients independently. In order to be able to guarantee patient safety at all times, the trainees always have learning assistants from the participating professions at their disposal.

In the meantime, IPSTAs have already started at nine locations and IPSTAs are being planned at about another dozen locations.

We support this process by actively networking the locations with each other and providing information material on how to set them up. Our special focus is on making the experience gained in the individual projects available to interested parties at other locations and on promoting student participation in the establishment of new IPSTAs. The former is achieved through good contact with the locations and the continuous development of our "How to IPSTA" guide. We are working towards our second goal by establishing contact with the student councils and by encouraging and enabling students to become involved in the local project through workshops and lectures at the bvmd's supra-regional conferences (federal congress, general meetings).

Three years after the start of the first IPSTA in Heidelberg, we now present a review with successes and challenges regarding the current status of the nationwide implementation.

Marzellus Hofmann is the dean for medical education and student affairs at Witten/Herdecke University (WH/U), faculty of health. After graduating from the college of education at Witten/Annen in 1992 he studied medicine at WH/U and then worked for several years as resident physician in the intensive care unit at the Community Hospital Herdecke. He returned to WH/U as a research fellow in 2003 and earned a Master’s degree in medical education from the University of Bern (Switzerland), faculty of medicine in 2007, followed by his doctorate at WH/U in 2012. In 2010 the American College of Surgeons appointed him as national educator Germany for Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS) courses.  For over the last ten years he is mainly in charge of the medical model curriculum , further curriculum development and innovation in medical education at the faculty of health, WH/U.

Gabriele Lutz is a neurologist and clinical specialist for psychosomatic medicine. Her educational and research interest lies in the development of personal intra- and interpersonal competencies in medical education. She developed reflection and mentoring formats for medical students to train intra- and interpersonal competencies; and she studied benefits of reflection formats for medical students, barriers to engage into reflection and cultural factors in medicine which impede the implementation of trainings for the development of intra- and interpersonal competencies in medical care and medical education.

Personal growth for person centered care

Person centered care involves persons. Persons with higher intra- and interpersonal competencies are more able to gauge care to individual patient needs and to cooperate successfully in teams, thus to provide higher quality in care. Students should therefore get opportunities to develop their intra- and interpersonal competencies. These are mostly taught in communication curricula in simulation settings. Deep transformative learning though and expertise building is based on practice in complex clinical situations in real meaningful personal involvement with oneself and others. It benefits from reflection and feedback in relevant clinical situations. Expertise in handling self-regulation, self-awareness, creativity, social and emotional challenges, motivation, values, attitudes is being built through self-reflection, mutual exchange and feedback. The main goal in this kind of curricular intervention is to develop a „growth mindset“, to become open for personal reflection, feedback and mutual exchange.

In this presentation teaching formats to foster reflective practice in medical education and relevant research findings will be presented and instruments to implement change in curricula and clinical settings will be discussed. I hope this presentation will encourage development promoting attitudes in medical education: that medical students develop the identities of doctors and necessary intra- and interpersonal competencies by supported participation in authentic clinical practice, coupled with guided reflection on intra- and interpersonal challenges in groups.

Prof. Dr. med. vet. Jan P. Ehlers, M.A., FTA

Career:

• Since 01.17.2017 Chair for Didactics and Educational Research in Health Science, Witten/Herdecke University, Faculty of Health
• Since 01.01.2017 Vicepresident of Witten/Herdecke University
• Since 01.10.2014 Professor for Didactics and Educational Research in Health Science, Witten/Herdecke University, Faculty of Health
• 01.02.2012-30.09.2014 Head of Competence Centre for E-Learning, Didactics and Educational Research in Veterinary Medicine
• 01.05.2005-30.09.2014 eLearning-Consultant at University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation
• 01.10.2004 – 30.04.2005 Senior veterinarian at Veterinary Clinic for Surgery, LMU Munich
• 01.04.2000 – 30.09.2004 Scientific assistant at Veterinary Clinic for Gynecology and Obstetrics, LMU Munich
• 1998-2000 Research assistant at Veterinary Clinic for Gynecology and Obstetrics, LMU Munich

Additional business:

• 2008 – 2015 Lectureship „Higher Education“ und „Assessment Methods“, Hochschuldidaktisches Netzwerk Mittelhessen
• 2008 – 2012 „Self-organized Learning“, „Instructional Design“ und „Education management“, MA Educational Media, Universität Duisburg-Essen
• 2009-2016 „Learning and teaching with media“, MA Bildungswissenschaften und Management für Pflege und Gesundheitsberufe, FH Hannover
• 2011-2016 Consultant for Assessment, European School of Advanced Veterinary Studies

Studies:

• 1990-1997 Veterinary Medicine at LMU Munich
• 1998-2000 Doctoral thesis at Veterinary Clinic for Gynecology and Obstetrics, LMU Munich
• 2006-2008 Master „Educational Media“ at Universität Duisburg Essen
• 2011 Veterinary Specialist for IT and Documentation

Membership:

• Editorial Board GMS – Journal for Medical Education
• Expert eLearningeuropa.info
• DVG AK „Didaktik und Kommunikationskompetenz“
• Board of Examination Tierärztekammer Niedersachsen „Fachtierarzt für Informatik und Dokumentation“
• Member in ViEW, AMEE, GMA, DVG, DGHD, ASME, Excellent Education by Stifterveband

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jan_P_Ehlers

https://twitter.com/Medizindidaktik

https://www.linkedin.com/in/medizindidaktik/

Daniel Wolpaw M.D., Professor of Medicine and Humanities at the Penn State College of Medicine, is a General Internist with a career focus on medical education and the humanities in Medicine. He moved to Penn State in 2013 and has had a major impact on multiple educational programs, including developing and co-directing the Systems Navigation Curriculum, developing and co-directing an innovative course in critical thinking, and serving as the design lead for educational innovation for the new University Park Curriculum Track. He strives to integrate the humanities in medicine through scholarship, teaching and clinical practice. Before moving to Penn State he served on the faculty at CWRU for 30 years where he was one of the architects of the 2006 curriculum transformation, Director of Undergraduate Clinical Education, and creator/director of the Scholarship in Teaching Awards Program.

The Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) has just selected Dr. Wolpaw as a winner of the 2020 Alpha Omega Alpha Robert J. Glaser Distinguished Teacher Award. Previous accolades include the Career Achievement in Medical Education Award from the Society of General Internal Medicine, the Newark Beth Israel Healthcare Foundation Humanism in Medicine Award, Honorary Research Fellow in Medical Education at the University of Tokyo and the Penn State College of Medicine Clinical Science Master Career Mentor Award. Dan wrote the lead chapter of the seminal textbook on educating students for health systems practice and has published in numerous journals, including the New England Journal of Medicine.

Underlying the concept of students as active, value-added participants in learning and patient care are critical concepts in education science. In particular, this presentation will highlight the contributions of John Dewey’s seminal thinking around experiencing vs. receiving learning, the importance of accessing intrinsic motivation as expressed in Self-Determination Theory, and the more recently trending idea of co-production as a foundational vehicle for authentic participation and collaboration.

Epidemiologist and Professor of the Medicine course at Universidade Federal de Jataí, Brazil. Professor at the Posgraduate Programs in Public Health and Health Teaching at the Universidade Federal de Goiás. Post-doc team member of Global Health Institute, University of Antwerp, Belgium in the research area of Global Health Research using Epidemiological Mixed Methods and she is currently coordinator of the International Citizen Project Covid-19 (ICPCovid) in Brazil. Post-Doctorate in Public Health Policy Evaluation, Carlos III Health Institute/Madrid and Post-Doctorate in Medical Education, Ribeirão Preto Medical School at USP. PhD in Epidemiology and Master in Public Health, Faculty of Public Health at University of São Paulo (USP). She has experience in public health surveillance, epidemiological methods, education and health communication. She worked as a Consultant for the Pan American Health Organization, providing services for the Strategic Information Center and response in Health Surveillance of the Ministry of Health of Brazil.

Due to the need for physical distance in face of the current pandemic, academic activities were suspended. However, we are aware of great students potential to contribute to the COVID-19 response while they learn public health.

On March 2020, in a Midwest Brazilian Public University, students and teachers developed developed a collaborative learning strategy in public health during the pandemic: write an epidemiological information bulletin.

The students who are part of the university's Epidemiology and Health Services Observatory (EpiServ) used Whatsapp and Google Drive as tools to enable teamwork through discussion groups and creation of shared documents, respectively, ensuring interactivity. The bulletin was finalized and revised by teachers involved to check the quality of the content, creativity and the ability to use simple, clear and objective language. After that, students felt the need to reach more people with their material and proposed the creation of a website for EpiServ (Figure 1). This website became a strategic platform to convey main news release by media, official documents from World Health Organization and Ministry of Health, updated epidemiological bulletins and the most recent scientific publications. The students had the opportunity to deal with interdisciplinary and relevant themes, such as physical and mental health during physical distance. According to the evolution of the pandemic in Brazil, students identified the importance of investing their time and knowledge in the production of daily epidemiological bulletins. Thus, by October 2020, more than 140 daily bulletins have been produced by this team of students.

Even without classes, medical students had the opportunity to contribute to the control of pandemic and feel part of this historic moment. The experience allowed new ways of teaching and learning, through the use of educational technologies currently present in our daily lives, but sometimes little explored by teachers effectively1. A crucial topic throughout the process is teacher feedback to students, showing how theoretical concepts are built in each practice and ensuring engagement and proactivity2 to constantly improve scientific dissemination to website readers.

The greatest success of this experience was the space created by students to be proactive, to develop their creativity and application of their acquired knowledge of public health.

In addition, they were able to understand the power of scientific dissemination for prevention and health promotion during a public health crisis.

1) Villela EFM et al. Student engagement in a public health initiative in response to Covid- 19. Medical Educations Adaptations. doi: 10.1111/MEDU.14199

2) Stokes DC. Medical Students in the COVID-19 Response: An opportunity to be proactive. Academic Emergency Medicine. doi: 10.1111/ACEM.13972

Nathaniel Long is a third-year medical student at the Penn State College of Medicine, USA. He is a curriculum chair for his class, which provides him the opportunity to work closely with medical education leadership to continually improve the education experience of students. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he collaborated with students, faculty, and hospital leadership to develop and participate in a student-driven response to meet the needs of the hospital system and community.

Contributions of health professions students to health system needs during the COVID-19 pandemic: Strategies, process, and educational opportunity.

The COVID-19 pandemic has posed an unprecedented challenge to health systems, particularly academic health centers that lead in providing advanced clinical care and medical education. While health professions students are limited in their contributions to direct clinical care, they remain the same smart, innovative, and motivated individuals who chose a career in health care and who are passionate about contributing to the needs of people in troubled times. The groundwork for operationalizing student commitment has already been established through the identification of value-added, participatory roles that support learning and professional development in health systems science and clinical skills. This pandemic has prompted a new look at how students can contribute.

At the Penn State College of Medicine, staff and student leaders formed the COVID-19 Response Team to prioritize and align student work with health system needs. This task required a nimble coproduction process that brought together all stakeholders to facilitate work. Through the development and implementation of a streamlined work-flow, 400+ students participated in over 20+ value-added roles to support the health system and surrounding community. Several examples of these roles include contact tracing to help limit the spread of coronavirus in our local communities, patient navigation to identify needs of recently discharged high-risk patients, and the development of health policy to inform lawmakers of health system needs.

These roles were designed to map to health system science competencies, allowing for elective credit opportunity. Students found great success and value in an elective co-created by students and faculty and an ability to be a value-added member of the task force team. While the pandemic has caused great hardship, it has provided a sandbox for innovation in medical education. Reflection from these experiences provides opportunities for educational advancements and insight into the role of the medical student.

As Associate Dean for Health Systems Education, Jed’s work focuses on: 1) exploring the relationship between education and health systems, and, 2) leading the field of Health Systems Science. Along with the Systems team, he has lead the implementation of 15+ programs related to health systems education, which have garnered national recognition from the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, US News and World Report, NPR radio, and AMA newswire.  Jed has a well-established track record for scholarship, and in particular, multi-institutional collaborations. He is lead author/editor of several textbooks, and has received funding from the American Medical Association, Association of American Medical Colleges, Health Resources and Services Administration, and Josiah Macy Foundation (Faculty Scholar Award). He mentors 25+ students, residents, and faculty per year.    

Value-Added Medical Education: How Medical Students Can Meaningfully Contribute to Patient Care

There is a pressing need for medical schools to transform educational experiences to more effectively align with evolving health systems. Although in years past students may have been viewed as valued team members, over the past several decades, there has been a steady decline in the engagement of students in contributory roles.  The current education model requires time for physicians to mentor and educate students, which can decrease clinical efficiency and negatively impact productivity.  As a result, student work may be relegated to a nonessential role on health care teams.  Although students can add value during clinical rotations, medical schools rarely explicitly identify these contributions as develop skills in health systems science.  Medical educators and system leaders have come to believe that students can be better integrated into the health care team and make meaningful, recognizable contributions to care starting early in medical school.  In this segment, the concept and challenges of value-added medical education will be described, and the intersections between health systems science education and value-added roles and tasks will be articulated. 

In the current situation of the COVID-19 pandemic, medical students across Germany have been recruited to support medical care professionals in hospitals and nursing homes. We aimed to analyze their motivations to help, their perceptions of stress and burden, and self-perceived acquisition of new skills.

We conducted a cross sectional online survey with standardized questionnaires (i.e. PSS, CDI, MtHQ) among medical students from May 29 to June 18, 2020.

Among 979 students (73% female, 27% male; mean age 24 ± 4 years), 75% proceeded with the online survey and 25% provided basis demographic data only (non-completer). Both groups did not significantly differ.  Among the completer, 52% were / are already working as volunteers during the pandemic in different medical areas (i.e., 33% ICU, 16% infection ward, 16% emergency unit, 16% ‘normal’ units at hospital), 37% would have liked to work, but did not get an employment, and 21% did not intended to voluntarily support the hospital staff. 52% had contact to COVID-19 infected persons.

Those employed stated that in 64% they have learned collaborative skills, 51% communication skills, 49% practical abilities, 48% crisis management, 38% organizational skills, and 30% medical knowledge.

Their motivation to help (as measured with the 12 item MtHQ) was categorized as 1) Altruistic intentions (which scored highest), followed by Practical Application / Increase of Knowledge, and Role Testing / Recognition which scored lowest. Those who were employed as volunteers had significantly higher scores for Altruistic intentions (F=39.8, p<.0001) and Practical Application / Increase of Knowledge (F=17.6, p<.0001), but lower psychosomatic burden (F=10.8, p=.001) and stress perception (F=6.7, p=.010). Those who did not intend to voluntarily help had significantly lower motivations to help (F>27.0, p<.0001), higher stress perception (F=10.8, p=.001) and psychosomatic burden (F=16.2, p<.0001), but did not significantly differ with respect to compassion (F=2.0, n.s.).

Students who decided against a voluntary employment in hospital are not less compassionate, but seems to be more stressed and in fear than their helping counterparts. Nevertheless, their altruistic intentions were significantly lower. Employed students stated several abilities and skills they have learned because of this engagement.     

Medical students´ intention to support health care professionals during the COVOID-19 pandemic were mostly altruistically motivated, but also to practically apply their current knowledge and to improve their skills and competences. This may have consequence for their medical education and future work as competent physicians.

Morgan Haines

Morgan Haines is a fourth-year medical student at the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Vancouver, Canada. Prior to starting medical school, he completed a BSc in Environmental Sciences at UBC.

Integrating COVID-19 Volunteer Response into the Year 3 MD Curriculum

On March 14, 2020, the University of British Columbia Faculty of Medicine removed medical students from their clinical rotations due to COVID-19 safety concerns. This sudden disruption meant medical students had no clear academic pathway forward. At the same time, students eagerly wanted to support the public health response but were unsure how to do so. 

Working with Dr. Mary Kestler, an infectious diseases specialist and UBC faculty member, students created the BC COVID-19 Medical Student Response Team. The goal is to coordinate safe opportunities for students to support physicians and public health authorities in response to COVID-19. Through partnering with the Faculty of Medicine, students were able to gain curricular credit for their volunteer work. To date, there have been over 700 student volunteers and 70 projects across the province of British Columbia, and students have gained invaluable experiences. 

This talk provides a brief overview of our experiences, lessons learned and highlights how empowering students to safety support public health efforts can benefit everyone. 

Beate Stock-Schröer

Student´s Employment during Corona 2020 : What did they learn?

With the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany 2020, there has been a great demand from and for medical students to be involved in health care. Students across Germany were placed in hospitals, retirement homes, nursing homes and health authorities as volunteers. We performed a cross-sectional study to address the question what students have learned in detail during their work.

Cross sectional online survey among medical students from May 29 to June 18, 2020.  Beside standardized questionnaires, students were invited to give a free text answer on what they have learned. Statements were analysed directly on the text material. Key categories and subcategories were formed using MAXQDA 11 (VERBI Software, 2019) following the Qualitative Content Analysis (Mayring).

979 medical students (73% female, 27% male; mean age 24 ± 4 years participated. 75% proceeded with the online survey (completer), among them 75 (10,2%) answered to the question with free text comments. Here, five main categories evolved: 1. Healthcare System. Students reflected on the situation in hospitals and organizational interrelations between different health authorities and hospitals. The free texts also provided answers indicating concern about the state of the healthcare system. 2. Self-development. Students developed own skills to cope with different stressful situations. They learned self-confidence to support clinical staff, but some of them commented in their free text, that they felt badly treated in hospital. Others complained, that they were not supported by their universities during the summer term. 3. Collaboration. Many comments were submitted on the importance of interprofessional practice and respect for other healthcare professions. Hierarchy was identified as a burdening work factor. 4. Practical Skills. Patient care, communication with patients and nursing activities were reported as an important outcome. 5. Management. Some of the students in this part of the study reported that they learned organizational procedures in a hospital as well as hygiene regulations.

Medical Students have a critical look at German healthcare system. They are concerned about the structures focusing on profit and financial issues and not on the factor public health and patients’ wellbeing. In addition, some of the respondents complained that in this extraordinary situation, support of universities as a player in the system has failed. These results show the need of implementing features of value added education into the curriculum. (1) Another outcome of this qualitative analysis is that students benefit from skills, which seems to be not part of their curriculum now, but is defined by the CanMEDS Roles. (2)

1) Gonzalo JD, Graaf D, Johannes B, Blatt B, Wolpaw DR. Adding Value to the Health Care System: Identifying Value-Added Systems Roles for Medical Students. Am J Med Qual. 2017 May/Jun;32(3):261-270. doi: 10.1177/1062860616645401   . Epub 2016 Apr 26. PMID: 27117639

2) Bugaj TJ, Schmid C, Koechel A, Stiepak J, Groener JB, Herzog W, Nikendei C. Shedding light into the black box: A prospective longitudinal study identifying the CanMEDS roles of final year medical students' on-ward activities. Med Teach. 2017 Aug;39(8):883-890. doi: 10.1080/0142159X.2017.1309377