MEDICAL SCHOOL EVALUATION & GRADUATION
Opportunities in Ophthalmology: Connecting Medical Students and Residents during a COVID-19 Crisis By Christopher Zhu and Brandon Lam
As the coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic surged in April 2020, unforeseen challenges emerged against the old medical education paradigm, requiring adaptations to address the abruptly altered landscape of student training. Under the guidance of Dr. Lilian Nguyen, Director of Medical Student Education at the Department of Ophthalmology at UT Health San Antonio, our team developed a virtual program to match medical students and ophthalmology residents to address diminished educational opportunities caused by COVID19 in a field with already limited curricular exposure. We then measured the effectiveness of a program matching medical student mentees with ophthalmology resident mentors in the hopes of promoting direct mentorship between mentees and mentors and creating lifelong career impacts. All 22 of our medical students completed program surveys four months apart, assessing attitudes and available opportunities on a scale from 0 (none) to 10 (significant) regarding mentorship, pursuing ophthalmology, research and how COVID-19 impacted these. All 9 of our participating residents likewise completed surveys measuring attitudes towards mentorship in the specialty and expectations regarding time commitment. We found from these surveys that while medical students felt COVID-19 tangibly affected available opportunities in ophthalmology at the outset of the outbreak, their participation in the mentorship program significantly increased their overall access to shadowing and research experiences in the specialty. Confidence among students regarding their knowledge of ophthal30
SAN ANTONIO MEDICINE • June 2021
mology also rose following participation and overall, the program was deemed valuable. In addition to benefitting medical students, residents maintained their high level of comfort in mentoring students and speaking about ophthalmology as a career before and after the program. Our residents also continued reporting high value regarding mentorship in ophthalmology and medicine at-large. Under novel circumstances plaguing the globe, we were able to create a microcosm allowing for some continuity regarding medical education and mentorship in the relatively small field of ophthalmology. Our team observed student interest in ophthalmology increase as they garnered the opportunity to develop career-long mentors, providing exposure to the field of ophthalmology which otherwise would not have existed during the COVID-19 pandemic. Christopher Zhu is a medical student at the Long School of Medicine, UT Health San Antonio, Class of 2023. Brandon Lam is a medical student at the Long School of Medicine, UT Health San Antonio, Class of 2021 and is an incoming UTHSA Ophthalmology Resident.
