Chapter Seven - Implementing digital learning for health

Abstract

The single largest challenge in contemporary medical education is the absorption, by the students of a rapidly expanding volume of medical knowledge in ways supporting critical thinking and initiative. There is a serious educational disparity between theoretical knowledge and clinical skills, or decision making capacity in medical education. Immersive and interactive, experiential digital education episodes provide impactful learning that conveys both formal as well as tacit knowledge through meaningful narratives. This chapter presents a brief rationale and implementation modalities for such experiential narratives. It explores endeavors for integrating virtual patients in various experiential modalities such as the 3D multiuser virtual environments (MUVEs), as well as Virtual and Augmented reality ones. Exploring future directions, this chapter closes with points about the necessary data modeling provisions, as well as the conceptual paradigm shift integrating these educational endeavors into a versatile, co-creative educational living lab environment for immersive experiential, and impactful medical learning.