Application of digital education in undergraduate nursing and medical interns during the COVID-19 pandemic: A systematic review

BACKGROUND: Due to the rapid spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) around the world, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared it a global pandemic on March 11, 2020. This declaration had an unprecedented impact on health profession education, especially the clinical clerkship of nursing and medical students. The teaching hospitals had to suspend traditional bedside clinical teaching and switch to digital education. OBJECTIVE: To systematically synthesize the available literature on the application of digital education in undergraduate nursing and medical interns during the COVID-19 pandemic. DESIGN: A systematic review informed by PRISMA guidelines. DATA SOURCES: Five electronic databases were systematically searched: PubMed, Embase, MEDLINE (OVID), CINAHL and the Cochrane Library. REVIEW METHODS: The retrieved articles were screened at the title, abstract, and full text stages. The Mixed-Methods Appraisal Tool (MMAT) was used to assess the quality of quantitative and mixed-method studies. Then, two reviewers extracted the quantitative data of the included studies. RESULTS: A total of 4596 studies were identified following a comprehensive search, and 16 studies were included after removing duplicates and screening, which focused on undergraduate nursing students (3 studies) and medical students (13 studies). We found that the standalone digital education modalities were as effective as conventional learning for knowledge and practice. Different educational technologies have different effects on the knowledge and practice of interns. CONCLUSION: Digital education plays a significant role in distance training for nursing and medical interns both now and in the future. The overall risk of bias was high, and the quality of evidence was found to be variable. There is a need for further research designing more quasi-experimental studies to assess the effectiveness of standalone digital education interventions for the remote training of nursing or medical interns to be fully prepared for emergencies.