Basic Sciences Medical Faculty and Their Challenges to Compassionate Teaching

Abstract

Basic sciences teaching faculty are important in combatting the mental health issues facing M1/M2 medical students. These faculty are key in helping students through the basic sciences by identifying those that are struggling, guiding them to necessary resources, reassuring them that they can attain their qualifications, and encouraging them to engage in active learning. Many of these faculty also fulfill official mentorship roles within the curriculum and advise students on academic and career aspects of their medical school pathway. However, faculty are also overwhelmed by institutional expectations (e.g., research) and student considerations (e.g., poor behavior, negative teaching evaluations). The result is that faculty are struggling to balance all these expectations, with negative experiences such as inappropriate student behavior and toxic academia severely affecting faculty and leading to a noticeable increase in instances of faculty burnout and compassion fatigue. With self-isolation and remote learning, many of these issues (e.g., poor student behavior) are likely to worsen and as a result, institutions need to reevaluate these issues to develop measures to protect faculty and allow them to do their job properly, prioritizing medical students and guiding them effectively through the first two years of the rigorous medical curriculum.