How the use of technologies can provide the infrastructure and basis for addressing many of the challenges in providing medical education in developing countries.

There is a vast number of lives which have been saved due to technological advancements in medical education, which varies considerably over seas because of the different methods for teaching medical students. The initial training in medical education is divided up into preclinical and clinical studies, in both of which technology has been involved in some nations. Tech has got both a dark and bright side but with the benefits far outweighing the disadvantages. I’ll focus on how tech has been and how it can be used to enhance and provide patient care. There are a lot of factors which are rapidly changing the medical education such as change in health care environment, research and innovation. Benefits of tech include improving of decision making, enhancement of acquiring of basic knowledge, fostering of team work and improvement in psychomotor learning among others. Some of the technology which has been employed or would need to be employed in nations whose health sector isn’t doing well, includes the following. Simulation. It’s aim is to imitate real patients, anatomic regions, or clinical tasks, and/or mirror the real-life circumstances in which medical services are rendered. The type of stimulation used at our university teaching hospital in Uganda is one which involves embedding of computer controls in a mannequin then use this setup to provide patient care management. However its use still needs more focus and concentration on because its not widely used in the teaching hospital which has led to the death of quite a number of patients as result of being managed by medical students who aren’t yet very competent with the clinical skills. However in some countries virtual reality stimulation has been launched which remains a source admiration for us. Wearable technologies. A wearable device is used for tracking a wearer’s vital signs or health and fitness related data, location, etc. Due to the on going digital revolution in the health care sector, medical wearables such as Google glass with artificial intelligence are providing an added value to healthcare with a focus on aiding early diagnosis, improving adherence to treatment, enhancing of patient monitoring, saving health care costs, improving information registry and enabling doctors to be able to make smarter and sharper decisions. Such technology however to some extent remains an impratical dream for our health care settings in my country. And due to its lack, this has made the work of many health care personnels tedious. However the newly set up faculty of applied sciences at our university is working upon on development of such technologies for example devices which can be used to track the patients compliance to medication. Mobile applications. These are routinely used by students for medical questions, patient management, and treatment decisions. Medical apps for iPhones and Android devices have eased students lives especially those who find reading books of large volumes as a challenge but such applications have also provided students with a quick review the medical knowledge at critical moments like on ward rounds. Although many focus on anatomy and physiology, biochemistry, some of them handle medical problem solving, diagnosis, and treatment. However it would be pretty nice if universities had there own websites from which students would access learning aids like references of such applications. Education of undergraduate medical students can be enhanced through the use of computer-assisted learning. For example the use of flipped classrooms in which students review a lecture online before the lecture session, and go to the classroom to have an interactive session with the lecturer. The time which the lecturer would be used to lecture would then be spent on further explanation of complex issues or discussing and solving questions in a more personalized guidance and interaction with students, instead of lecturing. This in addition equips students with prior knowledge about what they are to learn and it encourages them to be proactive. Until of recent has such a system been introduced in our university but even though, no such practice has been done by any lecturer. Such resolutions would help in solving some of the challenges medical students encounter like having to go over their reading materials over and over again because they attend lectures with prior knowledge which enables them to be more inquisitive in the lecture session. I believe that what technology holds for the future health care is more than what we may imagine today and I’m quite optimistic that tech will help in solving of all if not most of the challenges of health care sector.