The patients’ perspective of bedside teaching in the post-Covid era

Background Bedside teaching with real patients is vital to the education of medical students. With the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, all student-patient interactions were suspended in order to prevent the spread of the virus. Research has previously focussed on the medical professional and medical student views concerning bedside teaching, with less of a focus on patient insights. Aims The purpose and aims of this study were to explore the patient’s perspectives of encountering medical students and contributing to their learning in the clinical setting, beyond the Covid restrictions. Methods Qualitative semi-structured interviews were carried out with a cohort of Mayo University hospital inpatients, who had participated in a bedside teaching session. An interview guide was employed to facilitate consistent and analogous data. An interpretative phenomenological approach was used for data analysis yielding a number of themes. Results Participants recognised the value of their involvement in the clinical education of future doctors, in addition to the positive impacts of such contributions for their own future healthcare. Participants had no concerns about partaking in bedside teaching sessions relating to Covid infection. Conclusions This study assessed the opinions of hospital inpatients with regards to participating in clinical teaching sessions and found that they do not perceive their role as passive.