Challenges and Risks
12
2021-22 continued to see the impacts of COVID-19 on undergraduate medical education including:
- Social distancing and hybrid working reducing the number of trainees in sessions
- Impact on clinical services and tackling backlogs
- Suspension of Medical electives
- Staffing and recruitment concerns
- Wellbeing and burnout of students and trainers
Implementation began on the current Scottish Governments manifesto pledge to increase undergraduate medical degree programme student intake by 500 by 2028. This is currently challenging and is expected to remain a challenge in the immediate future, due to the following factors:
- A lack of infrastructure to support the increase in numbers
- A lack of affordable suitable student accommodation across Scotland but especially in rural locations
- Limitations on the size of teaching spaces in all settings
- Difficulty of increasing the number of placements in both secondary and primary care whilst maintaining high quality teaching
- A lack of time in job plans for trainers with continuing clinical pressures as clinical services continue to emerge from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic
