Doing without the residential component of a blended postgraduate rural medical programme during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic in New Zealand: student perspectives

ABSTRACT

Aim

Rural-targeted postgraduate medical training is a key factor associated with entering rural practice. Rural health professionals often experience geographical and professional isolation, which can impact their training and education. In New Zealand, during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, an established distance postgraduate rural medical programme replaced its in-person residentials with virtual workshops. This study aimed to gain insights into the student experience of the virtual workshops, with emphasis on exploring the effects of the absence of an in-person component.

Method

Qualitative exploratory design. All students who had completed a semester one 2020 University of Otago rural postgraduate module were invited by email to participate. Fifteen semi-structured interviews were conducted by video-conference. A thematic analysis was conducted using a general inductive approach.

Results

Three themes captured the main issues. 1. Making sure everyone is in the same boat: the key roles of an in-person component were identified as consolidation of learning, benchmarking and connectedness. 2. Learning but not connecting: virtual workshops were well facilitated, allowed continuation of study and the convenience of staying home, however connectedness faded. 3. We’ve got to keep a human touch in a digital age: looking beyond the pandemic, opportunities for streamlining virtual content were identified, however there was concern around diminished communication and cultural aspects of learning and the absent connection with rural health services and communities.

Conclusion

A virtual workshop is valuable in the COVID-19 environment but does not replace an in-person component of a distance postgraduate training programme for rural medicine.

KEYWORDS:

• Rural and remote health
• distance education
• rural health workforce
• COVID19 pandemic
• postgraduate education
• vocational medical training

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Professor Jean Hay-Smith of the University of Otago for commenting on the draft manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethics approval

Ethical approval for the research was obtained from the University of Otago Human Ethics Committee (D19/059).

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.