News / Medical Restoration "Grades are declining" due to Korona-ka, medical school also has difficulty in face-to-face lessons-Ask Satoshi Takahashi, Dean of Nagoya City University School of Medicine ◆ Vol.1

How does the new coronavirus infection (COVID-19) affect medical school education? Also, how will the role played by universities with medical schools change? Mr. Satoshi Takahashi, Dean of the Graduate School of Medicine and Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Nagoya City University, who ranked first overall in 2021 in the Nikkei Glocal's "University Contribution Survey", looks back on 2021 and develops in 2022. I heard (interviewed on December 2, 2021. Serialized twice in total).

Looking back on 2021, what were the interesting and difficult movements around the new Corona?

I couldn't give a student lecture face-to-face. In every grade, you can hear the voice saying, "When you look at the test results, your grades are declining." When everything goes online, some students go somewhere just by connecting to the internet in class. In pathology, I had them draw pictures online instead of microscopic training, but I felt that I hadn't learned. As a teacher, I don't know if there are any students because I can't see the reaction, and even if I ask a question, no one asks a question, which is very painful.

The most difficult thing about Korona-ka is dealing with students. I would like you to come to the university, but since we teachers also work at the hospital, if you get infected, you will bring it to the hospital, so I would like to avoid contacting students as much as possible. However, it is difficult for a teacher to keep away from it. At the same time, I don't know what kind of life students usually live, so it's also very scary. It was very difficult to decide which salt plum was better.

Depending on the course, students are prohibited from entering and exiting, and it seems that they are always thinking about how much contact they can have with patients even in hospital training. Depending on the course, there are various responses, such as stopping the scenes where students were outpatients and changing the range of access even in the operating room. There are various thoughts and there is a range that can be dealt with. The campus was not a monolith either.

──How did Nagoya City University handle online classes?

When the state of emergency was first declared in Aichi Prefecture (April 2020), we switched from face-to-face classes to online classes for that reason. From around June 2021, students requested that they "want to go to university and listen to classes", so we switched to a hybrid format that holds both online and face-to-face meetings. By this time, nearly 95% of the students had already been vaccinated, and the fact that they were aware of the vaccination status at the university also helped.

From January 2022, we have been informed that we will return to face-to-face classes. I have received complaints from my parents, and I don't know what will happen due to the influence of the Omicron strain, but I would like to return to face-to-face as much as possible (although I held a face-to-face class in the first week of January 2022). , Since the number of infected people of the new corona has increased rapidly, it will be a hybrid from the second week). I think that is the best for students. There is no interaction between students and it is difficult to make friends.

──Are you showing any kind of code of conduct to your students?

Not only the graduate school of medicine, but all graduate schools have been notified from the beginning of the epidemic. Check your symptoms every day, check your body temperature before going to school, disinfect with alcohol, do not do unnecessary activities, eat less than 2 people, etc. There are difficulties in not knowing if you are acting. There are basically no restrictions on club activities except for expeditions. I have the impression that students who are practicing in hospitals are acting with a certain level of awareness, but I find it difficult to thoroughly implement them in the 1st to 4th grades.

──Some say that online is better.

I think graduate school lectures go well with online. Most of the graduate students are working doctors, and while it was difficult to come to lectures from distant hospitals, the lectures that could be connected online from the hospital were quite popular.

It's also good that part-time teachers don't have to come from afar. However, if the staff on campus serves as a lecturer or if the class is for medical students, I think it is good to meet face-to-face.

──What is the importance of face-to-face lessons?

It is difficult for the medical school to be unable to practice. It is a problem that some doctors do not touch the microscope, but it is difficult to disinfect more than 100 microscopes in each class. It is difficult to partition everyone with an acrylic board, and it is not possible to have them study while consulting. It was a matter of course, but I am keenly aware that this was important.

I am afraid that poor education will lead to unprofessional doctors and doctors who behave inappropriately.

──What should medical school education be like as infectious diseases may continue to occur in the future?

I think that face-to-face is the main principle to ensure quality, and I think that medical schools all over the country are heading there now. At a minimum, it will be conducted in a hybrid manner, and face-to-face students and online students will be exchanged in half. However, this cannot be decided only by university doctors. When I go to school while the state of emergency is being issued, my parents complain, "Why are you gathering students at the university under these circumstances?" It's very difficult.

──What kind of infection control measures are you taking to implement face-to-face classes?

We try to specify seats so that we can identify the range of close contacts when an infected person comes out. In the lecture room with windows, I open the windows to ventilate, and even if there is no window, I try to blow the wind with a circulator and put in an air purifier, but I wonder if it is necessary any more. increase.

──It seems that it is also hindering activities to gather future doctors, such as open campuses.

The lab experience for high school students is now completely discontinued. It is unavoidable that high school students do not know their usual behavior and vaccination status, but it is very disappointing. Looking at the open campus, I feel that there are still many children who are aiming for medical school, but I would like students who are interested in laboratory experience and interested in research in the future to join the medical school, so I will proceed further quickly. I want to go there.