Medical Students and Early Patient Contact

Humans are social creatures, and touch is the most primitive form of relationship. In the context of the traditional medical examination, touch, palpation, is essential to diagnose or suspect pathology. But it is not only an issue of semeiotics. The physician's ability to examine a body through his or her hands is at the heart of the doctor-patient relationship. Moreover, we have been witnessing for many years to the progressive downgrading of the objective examination in clinical practice. First, the obsolescence of interaction with the patient due to the lure of diagnostic technology, then the "social distancing" of Covid-19 and, finally, the expansion of telemedicine has contributed to the distancing of caregivers from patients...

OBJECTIVES: Understand the patient experience of a pilot medical student-based patient navigator (PN) program. (2) Assess areas of improvement for further development as a model for expansion. METHODS: This was a cross-sectional study assessing patients' subjective experience of medical student navigators for rheumatological conditions. Current student navigators contacted enrolled patients by phone with both structured and free-response questions. RESULTS: 44 of 71 patients completed the questionnaire...

OBJECTIVE: This review aims to describe and compare the risk factors, clinical course, diagnosis, and parasitologic features of external ophthalmomyiasis. We also discuss the different preventive measures and the effect of global warming in a large case series reported from January 2000 to December 2022. METHODS: We perform a literature review of reported cases of external ophthalmomyiasis to determine the clinical characteristics, therapeutic management, and information on the organisms that most commonly cause external ophthalmomyiasis...

In dental education, the assessment of clinical activities is especially important, as students start to perform treatments on real patients beginning in the seventh semester. When entering the final exam, students must be capable of carrying out all treatments of a dental professional, as they will exercise their profession as dentists directly after the exam. During dental training, preparation for the performance of dental activities in a clinical context is achieved through preclinical coursework and early patient contact before the seventh semester to enhance competencies...

INTRODUCTION: Applications of early clinical exposure (ECE) are wide-ranging and reflect the important role that ECE plays in medical education. This review article aimed to highlight the dynamics, opportunities, and challenges of ECE in medical education. STUDY METHODOLOGY: This review article was conducted through a comprehensive search of electronic databases including PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, and Google search engine. The keywords used for the search were "early clinical exposure," "medical education," "clinical skills," "patient contact," and "medical students...

Purpose  In this proof-of-concept pilot study, we aimed to increase nurse practitioner (NP) student knowledge of ophthalmology to prepare NPs for encounters in primary care settings. The Association of University Professors of Ophthalmology (AUPO) and the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) endorse core knowledge that medical students should achieve. We assess the effectiveness of an innovative ophthalmologist-led curriculum based on these competencies tailored to issues NPs encounter in primary care...

BACKGROUND: Students' experience of bedside teaching (BST) on clinical placement has significantly decreased, with a shift in teaching away from the bedside. The educational value of teaching on ward rounds (WRs) has also been debated. OBJECTIVE: This research considered what constitutes good BST from the student perspective; guidance to support clinician teachers was produced. METHODS: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 10 second-year students and 10 fourth- and fifth-year students studying at Leeds Medical School...

BACKGROUND: Ownership of patient care is a concept that embodies a number of professionalism attributes and involves a feeling of strong commitment and responsibility towards patient care. Little is known about how the embodiment of this concept develops in the earliest stages of clinical training. The goal of this qualitative study is to explore the development of ownership of patient care in clerkship. METHODS: Using qualitative descriptive methodology, we conducted twelve one-on-one in-depth semi-structured interviews with final-year medical students at one university...

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate an experiential student clinical addiction research program by analyzing its components, evaluation survey data, and scientific outputs. METHODS: In 1995, we established a summer research program supporting trainees to gain exposure to clinical addiction research careers. This curriculum employed a three-pronged approach that combined mentored research training, didactic education, and clinical observerships for medical students and other trainees to acquire experience with addiction medicine and research...

BACKGROUND: The task complexity involved in connecting to telehealth video visits may disproportionately impact healthcare access for populations already experiencing inequities. Human intermediaries can be a strategy for addressing healthcare access disparities by acting as "technology helpers" in reducing the cognitive load demands required to learn and use patient-facing telehealth technologies. OBJECTIVE: We conducted a cognitive load theory-informed pilot intervention involving "warm accompaniment" telehealth helping sessions with patients at a Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC)...

The goals of this study were to determine the completion rates of patient order forms at the Cooper Rowan Clinic, a student-run free clinic, and to implement the use of a post-encounter phone call to improve completion rates, preventive medicine, and medical student clinical involvement. 151 patients completed a pre-intervention questionnaire before their visit. The questionnaire collected information regarding successfully completed order forms. First-year students were trained to perform phone calls and called their patients for five months...

Objective: Stereotypes among health professionals can jeopardize the delivery of collaborative healthcare and the achievement of positive patient outcomes. However, interprofessional education (IPE) can promote early clarification of roles, and understanding and mutual respect among trainees from different health disciplines. We studied the effects of IPE activities on the views and attitudes of pharmacy students toward nurse- and physician-trainees. Methods: Pharmacy students completed a structured written reflection exercise immediately following two separate IPE activities with nursing and medical students, both oriented around diabetes care...

BACKGROUND: Mattering is a psychosocial construct that describes an individual's perception that they make a difference in the lives of others and that they are significant in the world. The purpose of this study was to explore the current perception of behaviors that impact mattering among third year medical students on their surgery clerkship with the goal of improving the clerkship experience. METHODS: A qualitative interview study was conducted during the 2019-2020 academic year...

BACKGROUND: Research shows that the clinical learning environment can affect medical learners' levels of empathy and formation of professional identity. However, few studies examined the impacts of early exposure to the clinical learning environment on first-year nursing students' empathy levels and professional identity perceptions. AIM: This study aimed to explore effects of initial contact with the clinical learning environment on first-year nursing students' empathy levels and perceptions of professional identity...

Sarcomas arising from the cervix are rare, and the reported prevalence is 0.20-0.55%. A 15-year-old Para 0+0 secondary school student presented to the emergency department in shock with a 1-year history of painless vaginal protrusion, vaginal bleeding, foul-smelling vaginal discharge, occasional passage of blood clots, fatigue, fainting episodes, and weight loss. She was resuscitated with intravenous fluids and blood transfusions. General examination revealed a young girl with a 16-week sized abdominal mass...

INTRODUCTION: Early clinical exposure (ECE), or authentic human contact in a social or clinical context during preclinical training, has been adopted by many medical schools. This study aims to investigate how medical students' sense of professionalism changed after ECE intervention, with the aim of informing curriculum design to enhance student awareness of the importance of medical professionalism. METHOD: Focus groups of ECE students were held to collect data for the study...

Objectives: Handheld otoscopy is the standard tool used to teach ear examination in undergraduate and postgraduate medical education. Previous studies have shown that the undergraduate teaching of ear examination with handheld otoscopes is inadequate, resulting in low self-reported levels of student confidence in their diagnostic skills. With the increase in popularity of endoscopic ear surgery, an increasing number of otolaryngologists are using endoscopes for office examinations of the ear due to the method's superior visualization and excellent image qualities...

OBJECTIVES: Strasbourg University Hospital faced an important COVID-19 first wave, from early March 2020. We performed a longitudinal prospective cohort study to describe clinical and virological data, exposure history to COVID-19, and adherence to strict hygiene standards during the first pandemic wave in 1,497 workers undergoing a SARS-CoV-2 serological test at our hospital, with a follow up of serology result three months later. PATIENTS AND METHODS: 1,497 patients were enrolled from April 6 to May 7, 2020...

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the current headache medicine education paradigm in allopathic and osteopathic medical schools in the United States and Canada. BACKGROUND: There is a disparity in the number of clinicians specially trained to treat patients with headache disorders and the number of people who have them. Early education and exposure to headache medicine is crucial to address this disparity. However, the current state of headache education within medical schools across the United States and Canada is unknown...

Introduction: Universities with dental schools are faced with complex problems during the COVID-19 pandemic. Dentistry students are at a higher risk of contracting infections, specifically COVID-19, due to direct contact with patients. The aim of this study was to assess the knowledge, perception and attitude regarding COVID-19 among dentistry students in Austria. Methods: During the first lockdown in Austria, an online survey was distributed among 165 dentistry students in their clinical term at the Medical University of Vienna...