Health Sciences and Medicine Education in Lockdown: Lessons Learned During the COVID-19 Global Pandemic

The global COVID-19 pandemic has initiated an immediate and rapid digital upskilling of students, academics, and professional staff to enable transitions from more traditional face-to-face (F2F) learning to remote and/or multimodal delivery methods. This chapter provides an overview of the impact of COVID-19 on accredited medicine, nursing, and allied healthcare programs worldwide. We provide methods and flexible strategies that can be incorporated into the delivery of modern health science curricula during the current COVID-19 pandemic and beyond, as universities and programs undergo a digital transformation within learning and teaching. Two case studies illustrate the ability to harness technology to develop and deliver high-quality inclusive educational experiences for students during the pandemic. Top tips to optimize learner engagement, provision of multiple modes of participation, equity, and equivalency of experience, and enhancing the reusability of learning materials and artifacts for assessment or clinical placement preparation, are shared. Each case study highlights the transferability to other disciplines and legacy of these adaptations beyond COVID-19.