Understanding motivations behind medical student involvement in COVID-19 pandemic relief efforts.

BACKGROUND: Although students were removed from patient-facing settings at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic due to concerns of burdening teaching physicians and depleting personal protective equipment, some leaders suggest students can be effectively utilized when personnel resources may be scarce. There have been narrative discussions surrounding medical student involvement, but no studies exploring the attitudes of these students. The authors aim to quantify the degree to which factors influenced a medical student's decision to or to not volunteer during the pandemic and to characterize medical students' attitudes towards medical professionals' duty to serve in a pandemic. METHODS: The authors developed and tested a secure web-based survey before distribution to students at 23 different US allopathic medical schools that did not graduate medical students early to aid in pandemic efforts between April and June 2020. Of the 599 students who completed the survey, 65.5% self-identified as female and were on average 25.94 years old (SD = 2.5). Multiple comparisons were made based on volunteer status. Ordinal scale questions were compared with the Mann Whitney U test, and the Chi-Squared test was used for categorical variables using R version 3.62. RESULTS: 67.6% of students volunteered in pandemic relief activities and a majority of those students volunteered in non-patient-facing roles. Community service, new skills, and time commitment were top 3 influencing factors for students who volunteered, while risk to other, time commitment, and risk to self were top 3 influencing factors for students who chose not to volunteer. Compared to other specialties, students interested in primary care specialties agreed to a greater degree that physicians have a duty to serve in pandemic relief efforts. CONCLUSIONS: Medical students who volunteered cited self-serving factors and altruistic values as significant motivators. Students who did not volunteer were significantly more concerned with risks of COVID-19 exposure. However, medical students in general agreed that students should be allowed to volunteer in COVID-19 related relief efforts. As large areas of the United States continue to experience increases in COVID-19 cases, institutions should involve medical students in balancing the level of acceptable risk with the educational benefits.

3D PRINTED MEDICAL DEVICES: ISSUES FOR PATIENT SAFETY

One consequence of the Covid19 pandemic in 2020 was disrupted supply chains for medical devices. In response, many providers began onsite 3d printing medical devices, without special training or custom tailored instructions. Traditional laws protecting patient safety and tort liability regarding possible malfunction of medical devices are not prepared to address the manufacture of medical devices by enduser health care facilities. The USA Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is one regulatory body that has expressed its desire to validate these uses of 3d printing in emergencies, despite concern about these home-grown devices from the standpoint of patient safety. This article explores the uncharted legal landscape concerning the growing need for national or international regulation addressing 3D printed medical devices in Health care facilities (HCFs) and point of care (POCs) venues. New laws may be needed to protect the integrity of medical products within an overarching duty to protect patient safety. © 2022, William S. Hein & Co., Inc.. All rights reserved.

Global food supply chain resilience assessment: A case in the United Kingdom

As a result of Coronavirus disease (Covid-19), container trade volumes and container port throughputs in the world have both declined over the first half of 2020. Covid - 19 causes unprecedented disruptions to the countries where food supplies heavily rely on shipping, such as the United Kingdom (UK). It is vital to assess the associated food shipping systems to ensure national food supply resilience. This paper aims to assess the national food supply chain (FSC) resilience for the UK by considering food import dependency and shipping transport connectivity. A new national food connectivity index (NFCI) framework is formulated, and supporting data is collected from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), and the United Nations Commodity Trade (UN Comtrade). NFCI of the UK is calculated and compared with other countries. The formulation and analysis contribute to a newly proposed formal method to assess a nation's FSC resilience and observe and address the shortcomings of its food supply system for food security. © 2021 IEEE.