During the recent 2nd International Conference on Virtual Patients and MedBiquitous Annual Meeting, Rosalyn Scott, MD, from CTSNet in the US talked about issues in social media in medical education, asking how can social media bridge the relationship between student and learner?
As she explained, social media is a “powerful tool where students can be peer mentors for one another.” However, she adds: “A lot of work still needs to be done to see how we, as educators, can learn how to integrate and work within that medium to make the students feel comfortable.”
Rosalyn then outlined her other activities with virtual patients, focusing on the hospital workforce rather than the younger learner.
“How do we take those virtual patient modalities and nake them relevant for workers,” she asks. “How can we use these tools for ‘just-in-time’ education, for the discussion of an event that did not go well, or a new procedure that will be introduced. How do we use these technologies to teach people about how medications?”