Abstract
Health professional education (HPE) has taken a problem-based approach to community service-learning with good intentions to sensitize future health care professionals to community needs and serve the underserved. However, a growing emphasis on social responsibility and accountability has educators rethinking community engagement. Many institutions now seek to improve community participation in educational programs. Likewise, many Canadians are enthusiastic about their health care system and patients, who are “experts by lived experience,” value opportunities to “give back” and improve health care by taking an active role in the education of health professionals. We describe a community-based participatory action research project to develop a mechanism for community engagement in HPE at the University of British Columbia (UBC). In-depth interviews and a community dialogue with leaders from 18 community-based organizations working with vulnerable populations revealed the shared common interest of the community and university in the education of health professionals. Patients and community organizations have a range of expertise that can help to prepare health practitioners to work in partnership with patients, communities, and other professionals. Recommendations are presented to enhance the inclusion of community expertise in HPE by changing the way the community and university engage with each other.
Highlights
Health professional education (HPE) has taken a problem-based approach to community service-learning with good intentions to sensitize future health care professionals to community needs and serve the underserved
Involvement in the education of students Discussions of how health professionals should behave differently focused on the need for health professionals to work in partnership with patients and other health professionals
Our study of how individuals and organizations could be more involved in health professional education, from a community point of view, supports a number of promising directions for community-university engagement that go beyond outreach and service and could begin to address some of the limitations of episodic involvement in curriculum delivery and one-off Community service-learning (CSL) projects
Summary
Health professional education (HPE) has taken a problem-based approach to community service-learning with good intentions to sensitize future health care professionals to community needs and serve the underserved. Behind many programs is the belief that these settings teach students about health disparities, barriers to health care, and the social determinants of health (Hunt, Bonham, & Jones, 2011). This problem-based approach holds a deficit view of the community in which fixing problems is the focus of student learning rather than community strengths, expertise, and assets. It places students (who are often privileged) in a position of power that can reinforce stereotypes and sustain power disparities (Mitchell, 2008). These approaches uphold power inequalities that are counter to important shifts in health care practice such as patient-centred care (Montague et al, 2017) and shared decision-making (Légaré, Stacey, & Forest, 2007)
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