Expanding Pre-Hospital Emergency Medicine Teaching through Internationally Livestreamed Academic Forums

Abstract

Introduction: Changing expectations in the accessibility of medical education and concomitant increases in inclusion of technology have led to demand for novel content delivery methods in medical education. Classical paradigms of educational preference based on geographical accessibility are gradually being replaced in a progressively online and connected environment by learners' preference for convenience, with selection between educational options becoming increasingly based on the quality of the content, and not necessarily its physical proximity. Livestreaming a medical education programme presents a new set of technical, logistical, and ethical considerations. Cambridge University Pre-Hospital Care Programme delivers a regional academic Pre-Hospital Emergency Medicine (PHEM) teaching programme mapped to the GMC recognised sub-specialty of the national PHEM curriculum and this programme has begun to stream the programme's monthly forums. We describe a literature review on livestreaming in medical education, a summary of our results with livestreaming, and recommendations for organisations interested in similar expansion.