The Resurgence of the Open Lecture in Times of Pandemic

“The pandemic produced an imminent change in how the academic community it’s organized.”

The COVID-19 pandemic has been an unprecedented event in our lives and an unforeseen challenge for educational institutions. The characteristic elements of face-to-face education, such as the interaction between students and professors who are experts in different disciplines, have been transforming and migrating little by little to other communications media for learning such as webinars and distance seminars.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, health institutions’ primary objective has been clear: solve the crisis they face, find the answers, develop the necessary mechanisms to help patients, and avoid new infections.

At TecSalud, commitment to the community and its patients and ensuring its students’ academic continuity are the priorities. Nothing is more important than this. However, as the virus spreads and the voluntary quarantine lengthens, other purposes cannot be postponed. One of these commitments is promoting lifelong learning through spaces that encourage dialogue, analysis, and reflection that contribute to health professionals’ training.

“The open lecture is a model for decentralizing knowledge by generating discussion spaces among different interest groups; these promote collective and individual transformations.“

The course offerings have recently increased that cover more COVID-19 topics about the evolution of the virus, new treatments, and research protocols. However, the available content becomes more informative as knowledge about the virus increases. Still, most of the conferences and courses share a common deficiency, namely, the lack of planning or in-depth pedagogical design.

The pandemic produced an imminent change in how an academic community it’s organized. The expert speaker has to divide part of his time to research, another to share some of its novelties or findings with the academic community, must teach classes remotely, and assume other responsibilities of the profession. For this reason, the concept of the Open Lecture is reappearing. It is a model for decentralizing knowledge by generating discussion spaces among different interest groups; these promote collective and individual transformations. This educational innovation has four principles.

The four principles of the open lecture

• Relevant content: This necessity arises in response to the need for changes and improvements in our environment.

• Speakers from the community: The experts who share their knowledge no longer have to be professors with a university position. Now they are also members of the civil society, opinion leaders, students, and patients.

• Extended range: In the computer age, learning spaces have a social reach belonging to a global and virtual network.

• Focus on reflection: The purpose is not to guarantee the development of competencies, but rather to invite reflection and provide a space for discussions and knowledge building.

Hence, the TecSalud Virtual Open Lecture (2020) has emerged from the need for health education as a proposal that aims to generate spaces and training activities for reflection and promote a culture of transformation. The lecture constitutes a space where knowledge is open and free not only for Tecnológico de Monterrey’s internal community but also for the external public. Virtual delivery is an efficient method of socializing the knowledge of multiple disciplines in the field of health. Patients, students, professors, and leaders from different disciplines, fields, and countries alike participate. The concept considers multiple venues such as conferences, seminars, and discussion forums that enable the participants to create an integrated vision of their environment.

Unlike the multiple courses that focus on delivering updated content to the participants or that refer to mastering a particular competency, the virtual open lecture envisions lifelong learning. The TecSalud Virtual Lecture proposal, which emerged in the coronavirus context, has developed different resources organized according to the content of the various environments where health professionals practice:

• Clinical care physicians

• Academicians with the students in training cycles

• Leaders within the community

• Health and wellness promoters

• Researchers

The clinical care physician is the health professional prepared to offer the best, safest, patient-centered care. To achieve this, the physician must have the ability to identify trends and know discoveries that complement his or her diagnostic or therapeutic intervention skills. The lecture has disseminated information on how COVID-19 affects the adult patient, emphasizing airway management and ventilatory support. Some examples of the activities are:

• Ventilatory support for COVID-19 patients

• Pediatrics and COVID-19, what we have learned

• COVID-19 and pregnant women, newborns, children, and adolescents

The development of the academician’s role in the training cycles makes it possible for the profession to transcend as a guild, ensuring the next generation of specialists cares for patients. In this sense, the open lecture offers discussion spaces to professors who collect educational innovation experiences in various contexts and tables of speakers from different countries to present a comparative view of the various strategies implemented by schools of medicine. Some examples of these activities are:

• The role and contribution of resident doctors in health systems in the face of the contingency of the COVID-19 pandemic

• Leadership, digital education strategies, and clinical training for residents

• Best Practices in Medical Education in Canada, USA and LATAM in times of COVID-19 and consequences in planned world strategies

Participation as a leader within the community describes a professional in the health system involved in designing and supporting public policies that ensure society’s quality of life. The open lecture presented multiple symposia and seminars as spaces for reflection on the health emergency’s ethical dimensions. Some examples of the activities are:

• Dissemination, deliberation, and analysis of bioethical aspects of COVID-19

• The social contract, responsibility, and risk

• Ethical, philosophical, and humanistic aspects

The promoter of health and well-being describes a professional involved in raising awareness for individuals’ rights regardless of ethnicity, gender, or social class. The open lecture has been a space for discussion on mental health issues, methodologies, and techniques that promote healthy lifestyles, well-being, and emotional health for students and the general public. Some examples of the activities are:

• Psychological implications of confinement at home and family environment

• Lifestyle, Wellness, Emotional Health, and COVID-19

• Living with the new normality: how are we doing?

The researcher for the generation of knowledge focuses on contributing to the assessment and continuous improvement of patient care and basic sciences. The main objective is to improve the quality of life and the health system. The open lecture facilitates spaces to discuss goals and strategies that impact the community favorably. Some examples of the activities are:

• Diagnostic strategies for COVID-19 from the research area

• Detection methods for the novel coronavirus

• Joint webinar on COVID-19: current institutional research and development efforts

There will be a “before” and “after” COVID-19. The role of health-training institutions has transform participating as an active agent in the well-being of the community. To the extent that we cultivate spaces such as the Virtual Lecture and make these available to the community, we ensure the profession’s legacy via training for reflection and promoting a culture of transformation.

About the authors

Jorge E. Valdez-Garcia (jorge.valdez@tec.mx) is the Dean of the School of Medicine and Health Sciences (EMCS), with 25 years of professional and postgraduate teaching experience. He is a Researcher (SNI 1) in health sciences, author of three books, ten chapters, and more than 80 research articles. The Dean is Titular Academician of the Mexican Academy of Surgery and a founding member of the National Academy of Medical Education.

Mildred Vanessa López Cabrera (mildredlopez@tec.mx) is the Director of Innovation and Educational Research at the School of Medicine and Health Sciences. She has a Ph.D. in Educational Innovation. She is the author of more than 40 articles and 11 book chapters. Her other qualifications include Fellow of medical education of the FAIMER Institute and the European Association of Medical Education, member of the Latin American Federation of Clinical Simulation and Patient Safety, member of the National Academy of Medical Education, and founding member of the Healthy Living for Pandemic Event Protection (HL – PIVOT) Network.

References

TecSalud Virtual Open Lecture. Available at: http://catedravirtual.tecsalud.mx/

Editing by Rubí Román (rubi.roman@tec.mx) – Observatory of Educational Innovation.

Translation by Daniel Wetta.

Jorge E. Valdez-García

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