‘GP Live’- recorded General Practice consultations as a learning tool for junior medical students faced with the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions

Abstract

Background: First year medical students value doctor and patient contact. However, it can be challenging to achieve positive exposure to primary care on a large scale. The COVID-19 pandemic has placed even greater pressure on placing students in General Practice (GP). Aim: To assess the feasibility and acceptability of showing Year 1 medical students authentic recorded consultations between GPs and patients, and then explore what they gained from this. Method: Using Panopto® Video Platform, we pre-recorded real Primary Care consultations, with patient and GP consent, which were then processed securely using the University of Aberdeen server. These were shown to all Year 1 medical students who immediately debriefed these consultations in small groups with a GP tutor. Subsequently two focus groups were held with 11 students to evaluate what they had learnt. Learning outcomes: The consultations were easy to record and play during the teaching session, although there were some issues with sound quality. All students in the focus groups enjoyed the experience. They gained new knowledge about the skills of GPs, and recognised GPs as positive role models. Students were able to identify a variety of communication and consultation skills used by the GP, which reinforced their teaching on these delivered elsewhere in the course. Conclusion: Using pre-recorded consultations as a teaching tool is reproducible, time-efficient and beneficial to students. We propose that this model of using authentic 'live' interactions between GPs and patients represents a valuable undergraduate educational opportunity and could be utilised by medical schools internationally.

Technology-delivered undergraduate medical education involving patients and carers: A rapid systematic review

“…Ten out of the 20 included studies used pre-recorded videos to provide the patient’s perspective on their illness or demonstrate doctor-patient consultations [22–31]. Four studies involved remote consultation technology for student involvement in clinical consultations using telehealth platforms, video-conferencing software, and telephone [32–35]. Three studies used online technology, including an online medical e-forum where registered patients submitted questions [36], an online interactive patient simulation tool [37], and online didactic training [38].…”

“…One study, by Harless et al [23] employed professional actors and non-actors who all had experience with the health problems they were portraying in patient roles. Four studies evaluating remote consultations using telehealth technology involved “live” interactions with authentic patients [32–35]. The remaining studies involved patients in the development of materials that featured later in medical teaching (via technology).…”

“…These fourteen studies described patient and carer involvement categorised at Level 1 of Towle and colleagues’ [5] taxonomy [22-31, 36-38, 41]. Six studies involved patients in real-time clinical or educational encounters led or observed by students [32-35, 39-40], reflecting Level 2 of Towle et al’s taxonomy, although in two of these studies the authenticity of the patients is unclear [39–40]. No study reported patient and/or carer involvement above Level 2.…”

“…The MMAT score distribution for the included studies were summarised as follows: low quality n=3 papers [29, 34, 37], moderate quality n=2 [22, 41] and high quality n=15 papers [23-28, 30-32, 33, 35, 36, 38, 39, 40]. The two mixed-methods studies scored 5/5 and 3/5 respectively in the quality criteria for their qualitative and quantitative components respectively [28, 33].…”

A Green Electrochemistry Experimental Kit: Student’s Achievements on Lectrofun 2.0

“…Therefore, all levels of educational institutions are forced to operate remote teaching into practice. Many creative temporary solutions benefited from the experiences of remote teaching, such as game-based learning (Fontana, 2020;Yang et al, 2020), project-based learning (Nerantzi, 2020;Yustina et al, 2020), and recorded teaching videos (Danjou, 2020;Dow et al, 2020). Smith and Watson (2019) recognised that STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) should provide important skills and insights into alternative futures as ways forward for economic, social, and environmental sustainability and education.…”