Responding to hospital system and student curricular needs: COVID‐19 Student Service Corps

1. WHAT PROBLEMS WERE ADDRESSED?

Throughout March 2020, cases of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) grew exponentially, and New York emerged as an epicentre of the crisis. Social distancing, shortages of personal protective equipment and clinical care needs necessitated that students be removed from the clinical setting. A group of students, faculty members and administrators was formed to identify ways in which students could be involved in supporting the health system. Immediately identified areas of need included maintaining virtual medical education, supporting rapid adoption of telemedicine, assisting high‐volume hotlines and providing well‐being support to providers and students. The COVID‐19 Student Service Corps (CSSC) was devised and deployed at Columbia University Irving Medical Center with the mission of supporting health systems and their patients, workforce and communities facing the COVID‐19 pandemic through interprofessional student service‐learning projects (see www.ps.columbia.edu/education/covid‐19‐student‐service‐corps‐cssc).

2. WHAT WAS TRIED?

The CSSC leadership team developed guiding principles, including service‐learning guidelines, and service project ideas that were found to be successful. Guiding principles included:

• Needs are identified by the health care system.

• A service‐learning model, in which students learn, reflect and grow in their professional and personal identities when serving their communities, is utilised. ¹

• Leadership and collaboration are interprofessional when possible.

• Faculty member and student collaboration; oversight and supervision help students serve the health care system and communities.

Project areas to consider given local health care setting needs:

• The 'COVID‐19 Hotline staffing' of community‐facing and internal staff lines.

• 'Telemedicine Video Assist' to rapidly place patients onto institutional telehealth platforms.

• 'Telemedicine Remote Patient Monitoring' of COVID‐19‐positive patients after discharge.

• The 'COVID‐19 Research' support.

• 'Information Services' to produce high‐quality, digestible resources on COVID‐19 for patients, families, faculty members and students.

• 'Medical Education' to provide high‐quality ongoing curricular experiences for pre‐clinical students.

• 'Mental Health and Well‐Being' support for students, faculty members, staff and community members.

• 'Patient Population Outreach' to communicate anticipatory guidance about COVID‐19 and care seeking to high‐risk populations.

• 'Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) Task Force' to organise procurement, donation and manufacturing of PPE from the community.

3. WHAT LESSONS WERE LEARNED?

To get started, steps can include forming an interdisciplinary oversight committee, developing a mission and partnerships, identifying and responding to health system needs, recruiting interprofessional faculty members and student volunteers, developing systems for feedback, engaging in reflection and continuous quality improvement exercises, and giving students the option of academic credit for participation and engagement in service learning.

Webinars were held for the leadership team to rapidly share ideas and project information with students. A toolkit was developed to aid replication at health professions schools nationally and across the globe. More than 1300 students, faculty members and administrators were eager to contribute ideas and to volunteer, and projects were identified, staffed and initiated within a matter of days. An oversight committee, faculty members, student project leaders, and student coordinators for each project were essential. Email, social media, and collaboration platforms were important resources for administration of the CSSC.

Hospital regulations and inter‐institutional technological differences created barriers to launching projects as quickly as they were conceived. Members have learned that patience, humility and tenacity are important qualities to help work through barriers. Being nimble to move students across projects based on urgency and need has also been important.