A Preliminary Study on Uncovering Medical Students' Unprofessional Behaviors from YouTube Videos

Reclaiming the concept of professionalism in the digital context: a principle-based concept analysis

BACKGROUND

There has been an alarming surge in the usage of social networking sites (SNSs) by healthcare professionals (HCPs) without adherence to the principles of professionalism. The widespread use of SNSs in medical practices has been coupled with reports of breaches of professional behaviors. Despite the benefits of SNSs, skepticism prevails about a clearly defined role for SNSs within medicine based upon the core principles of professionalism. Thus, there is a need to understand the manifestations of professionalism in the digital context, classically known as e-professionalism. This study systematically examines HCPs' perceptions of e-professionalism to advance a thorough understanding of e-professionalism.

METHODS

This concept analysis was performed using the principle-based approach of Penrod and Hupcey. In January 2023, we searched the databases of PubMed and ISI Web of Science for English-language articles specific to 'e-professionalism' in the medical field. The final selected research corpus of 63 articles was analyzed in this study.

RESULTS

A comprehensive analysis of the selected articles highlighted that e-professionalism is an epistemologically mature and distinct concept by a standard definition. However, inconsistencies in conceptual meanings were reported due to varied interpretations despite digital literacy. The pragmatic utility showed a lack of sound methodological and philosophical paradigms. Perhaps the rapid technological advancements and manifestations have hampered linguistic maturity. However, logically, e-professionalism is perceived as an extension of conventional professionalism but with a focus on a distinct framework with a set of attributes to be digitally relevant.

CONCLUSION

This study identifies a scarcity of research about the collective perspective of essential stakeholders, underpinning the need to further explore e-professionalism due to its emerging complex nature within the digital context. There is also a recognition that a framework is essential to guide future HCPs to yield a profound understanding and to provide remediation strategies in the rapidly advancing medical field in digital realm.

Exploration of Cyberethics in Health Professions Education: A Scoping Review

As digital technologies rapidly integrate into Health Professions Education (HPE), understanding cyberethics is increasingly crucial. This scoping review explores the pedagogy of cyberethics in HPE, highlighting a significant gap in explicit definitions and conceptualizations. Additionally, the absence of specific theoretical frameworks in most documents raises concerns about research progression. Only four articles introduce educational interventions in cyberethics, indicating a promising avenue for future research. While comprehensive search methods are employed, limitations, including language biases, exist. Future investigations should broaden the discourse to encompass ethical implications of emerging technologies within HPE. Cultivating comprehensive, culturally sensitive, and inclusive guidelines is vital for ethical digital practices in the health care community.

Online medical education using a Facebook peer-to-peer learning platform during the COVID-19 pandemic: a qualitative study exploring learner and tutor acceptability of Facebook as a learning platform

BACKGROUND

In recent years, higher education institutions have been moving teaching online, accelerated by the pandemic. The Remote Learning Project (RLP), based at the Norwich Medical School (NMS) in the United Kingdom (U.K.), was a peer-to-peer teaching program developed to supplement medical school teaching during the pandemic. The teaching was delivered through Facebook using peer-to-peer teaching. Tutors were final year medical students, teaching medical student learners in lower years. Tutors and learners perception of peer-to-peer online learning delivered through the Facebook Social Media (SoMe) platform was investigated.

METHODS

This qualitative study recruited tutor and learner participants from NMS by email, participation in the study was voluntary. Online semi-structured interviews of both tutors and learners in the remote learning project were conducted. The data was analysed using thematic analysis.

RESULTS

Seven participants were interviewed. Five themes were identified; education (learning/teaching), productivity, data security, professionalism, and usability of the platform. Learners enjoyed the asynchronous nature of the platform and both learners and tutors enjoyed the peer-to-peer nature of the RLP, including the ability to immediately and easily answer on Facebook comments. Some learners felt distracted on Facebook, whilst others enjoyed the reminders. The mix of social and professional on the platform was met with caution from tutors. Both learners and tutors enjoyed the familiarity of the platform.

CONCLUSIONS

The study found that SoMe may be a credible platform to deliver online peer-to-peer teaching. Educators should consider the ergonomics of SoMe platforms when designing online curriculums. Guidelines for educators should be developed to better guide educators on the effective and safe use of SoMe as a learning tool.

Defining Potentially Unprofessional Behavior on Social Media for Health Care Professionals: Mixed Methods Study

BACKGROUND

Social media presence among health care professionals is ubiquitous and largely beneficial for their personal and professional lives. New standards are forming in the context of e-professionalism, which are loosening the predefined older and offline terms. With these benefits also come dangers, with exposure to evaluation on all levels from peers, superiors, and the public, as witnessed in the #medbikini movement.

OBJECTIVE

The objectives of this study were to develop an improved coding scheme (SMePROF coding scheme) for the assessment of unprofessional behavior on Facebook of medical or dental students and faculty, compare reliability between coding schemes used in previous research and SMePROF coding scheme, compare gender-based differences for the assessment of the professional content on Facebook, validate the SMePROF coding scheme, and assess the level of and to characterize web-based professionalism on publicly available Facebook profiles of medical or dental students and faculty.

METHODS

A search was performed via a new Facebook account using a systematic probabilistic sample of students and faculty in the University of Zagreb School of Medicine and School of Dental Medicine. Each profile was subsequently assessed with regard to professionalism based on previously published criteria and compared using the SMePROF coding scheme developed for this study.

RESULTS

Intercoder reliability increased when the SMePROF coding scheme was used for the comparison of gender-based coding results. Results showed an increase in the gender-based agreement of the final codes for the category professionalism, from 85% in the first phase to 96.2% in the second phase. Final results of the second phase showed that there was almost no difference between female and male coders for coding potentially unprofessional content for students (7/240, 2.9% vs 5/203, 2.5%) or for coding unprofessional content for students (11/240, 4.6% vs 11/203, 5.4%). Comparison of definitive results between the first and second phases indicated an understanding of web-based professionalism, with unprofessional content being very low, both for students (9/222, 4.1% vs 12/206, 5.8%) and faculty (1/25, 4% vs 0/23, 0%). For assessment of the potentially unprofessional content, we observed a 4-fold decrease, using the SMePROF rubric, for students (26/222, 11.7% to 6/206, 2.9%) and a 5-fold decrease for faculty (6/25, 24% to 1/23, 4%).

CONCLUSIONS

SMePROF coding scheme for assessing professionalism of health-care professionals on Facebook is a validated and more objective instrument. This research emphasizes the role that context plays in the perception of unprofessional and potentially unprofessional content and provides insight into the existence of different sets of rules for web-based and offline interaction that marks behavior as unprofessional. The level of e-professionalism on Facebook profiles of medical or dental students and faculty available for public viewing has shown a high level of understanding of e-professionalism.

Social Media in Health Studies: A Systematic Review of Comparative Learning Methods

Learning modifications particularly increased due to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, which made it necessary to offer distance health education for many months. Social media allows students to have interactive activities such as discussing specific subjects or sharing data with each other, and also to have interactions with their teachers and tutors. So, we aimed to compare the effects of the use of social media on knowledge, skills and perceptions in health students compared to other methods. We performed a systematic review on PubMed, ScienceDirect and Embase about comparative learning methods using social media. The search followed PRISMA guidelines, and the quality assessment of the studies was performed using the Medical Education Research Quality instrument (MERSQI). Eight studies were analyzed including 1014 participants. Mean age ranged from 19.9 to 23.4 years, and 70% were females. About 54.4% of the participants were medical students and 20.9% were dental students. The mean MERSQI was 11.7 ± 2.6. Various subjects were included-anatomy, cultural competences, sterile surgical techniques, radiology, arthrocentesis, medical pathologies and cariology. As far as knowledge evaluation was concerned, we found that the use of social media may have had a positive effect from a short-term point of view but results concerning skills were less consistent across studies. Students usually had a positive perception of the use of social media as a complementary method but not as a complete alternative so it is not excluded that this effect might result from an increase in working time. The impact on patient care should also be assessed in future studies.