The challenges of "continuing medical education" in a pandemic era

Closure of medical schools or the barring of "live patient" contact during an epidemic or pandemic is potentially disruptive to medical education. During the SARS epidemic, the use of web-based learning, role play, video vignettes and both live and mannequin-based simulated patients minimised disruptions to medical education. This article examines the pedagogical innovations that allow clinical teaching to continue without medical students examining actual patients, and proposes a contingency plan in the event of future outbreaks that may necessitate similar containment measures.

Harnessing the IT factor in medical education

Escalating healthcare costs in Singapore have produced a significant movement of patients into ambulatory care, and the consequent dearth of clinical teaching materials. This deficiency has likewise prompted the creation of ambulatory teaching clinics and the use of standardised patients and simulators. In the last few decades, educators have utilised digital technology, for instance, digitally recorded heart and breath sounds, and digitised video vignettes, in medical education. We describe several pedagogical initiatives that we have undertaken at our university school of medicine.

Take a bao if you are not superstitious

<p><b>INTRODUCTION</b>Singaporeans are superstitious, and medical staff are no exception to the rule. We conducted a survey to determine the prevalence of superstitious beliefs and practices amongst doctors, nurses and medical students in Singapore.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>Internet and face-to-face surveys of 68 respondents, all of whom completed the survey after being threatened with curses and hexes.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>Sixty-eight doctors, nurses and medical students responded to our survey. Only 11 admitted to being superstitious, yet 31 believed in the ill-fortune associated with eating bao or meat dumplings, 6 in the nefarious powers of black (5) or red (1) outfits on call, and 14 believed that bathing (6 insisting on the powers of the seven-flower bath) prior to the onset of a call portended good fortune, in terms of busy-ness of a call. Twenty-four believed in "black clouds", i.e. people who attracted bad luck whilst on call, and 32 refused to mouth the words "having a good call" until the day after the event. We discovered 2 hitherto undescribed and undiscovered superstitions, namely the benefits of eating bread and the need to avoid beef, for the good and ill fortune associated with their ingestion.</p><p><b>DISCUSSION</b>Superstitious practices are alive and well in modern-day Singapore, the practice not necessarily being restricted to the poorly-educated or foolish.</p>