Graduate Health Professional Student COVID-19 Experiences: An Era of Uncertainty
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.47611/jsr.v10i1.1148Keywords:
COVID-19, Graduate Students, Challenges, Pandemic, Health Professional StudentsAbstract
On March 11, 2020 the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a global pandemic (World Health Organization, 2020). At this time many universities and schools in the United States decided to move to strictly online learning. This study sought to investigate how graduate students in five health professional programs at a private university in Virginia were impacted by and coping in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. This study, which utilized an anonymous survey, brought to light five different themes regarding what students saw as their biggest challenge. These themes included learning difficulties, pandemic specific concerns, mental health, maintenance of routine/schedule, and family responsibilities. Respondents were also asked if they felt students could be utilized in any capacity if another pandemic were to arise. Students felt that they could be helpful in assisting medical professionals, public health outreach, volunteer work and assisting fellow students. Through this research, information about how pandemics affect graduate health care students can be better understood, and highlight potential solutions by extension, in the setting of a future pandemic.
Downloads
Metrics
References or Bibliography
Cacioppo J. & Cacioppo S. (2014). Social relationships and health: The toxic effects of perceived social isolation. Soc Personal Psychol Compass. 2014, 8(2), 58-72. doi:10.1111/spc3.12087
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2019, June 11). 2009 H1N1 Pandemic. https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/2009-h1n1-pandemic.html
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2020, May 8). Public health response to the initiation and spread of pandemic COVID-19 in the United States. https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6918e2.htm
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2020, September 17). Provisional death counts for coronavirus disease (COVID-19). https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/index.htm
Irfan, B., Irfan, O., Ansari, A., Qidwai, W., & Nanji, K. (2017). Impact of caregiving on various aspects of the lives of caregivers. Cureus, 9(5), e1213. https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.1213
Khalil, R., Mansour, A. E., Fadda, W. A., Almisnid, K., Aldamegh, M., Al-Nafeesah, A., Alkhalifah, A., & Al-Wutayd, O. (2020). The sudden transition to synchronized online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic in Saudi Arabia: A qualitative study exploring medical students' perspectives. BMC medical education, 20(1), 285. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-020-02208-z
Smalley, A. (2020, July 7). Higher education responses to coronavirus (COVID-19). https://www.ncsl.org/research/education/higher-education-responses-to-coronavirus-covid-19.aspx
Wenjung C, Fang Z, Hou G, Han M, Xu X, Dong J, & Zheng J. (2020). The psychological impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on college students in China. Psychiatry Research, 287. doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2020.112934
World Health Organization. (2020, June 29). Rolling updates on coronavirus disease (COVID-19). https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/events-as-they-happen
World Health Organization. (2020, July 11). United States of America COVID-19. https://covid19.who.int/region/amro/country/us
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
Copyright (c) 2021 Kaitlyn Forster, Samantha Souhrada; Stephanie Bernard
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Copyright holder(s) granted JSR a perpetual, non-exclusive license to distriute & display this article.
