Face to face education to virtual classroom in the health sector during covid pandemic

Abstract

The lockdown posed a great impact on teaching and learning process which aided in the shift of face to face education to virtual classroom. As the e- learning was newly introduced, it was difficult to execute initially due to prior unpreparedness. We put forth this study to analyse student's perspective and challenges faced in online education during pandemic times.The study was done in medical and allied health science colleges of Chennai and Puducherry. This is cross-sectional study conducted between June and August 2020. This is an online survey conducted through google forms circulated to undergraduates and post graduates of medical and allied health science courses. Frequencies and percentages were used to express the data. Statistical Analyses were done by SPSS software and graphs were made by Microsoft excel. We received response from 419 participants. Mobile phone was the widely used gadget to access online class. Most of the institutes conducted online class daily and assessment twice weekly. In student’s point of view, though e- learning had several disadvantages like poor net connectivity, clinical training inadequacy, difficulty in attending class for longer duration and unfavourable learning environment, it proved constructive at pandemic time. On improvement in the design of the learning environment and teaching system, the online learning platform would better to serve its purpose in future pandemic.