Rewords and Struggle of Online Teaching of Pathology During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Middle East Medical Students’ Judgment

Introduction: Online learning involves the delivery of educational instructions regarding a subject using the internet. Pathology is an experimental subject that requires students to learn about disease development via unpleasant photos and slides. This study aims to determine the rewards and struggles of online pathology learning during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic at the Al-Qunfudah Medical College, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Methods: Using an online questionnaire comprising three sections of 23 questions (12 questions about the positive perception of online teaching and 11 about the negative perception), we surveyed second and third-year pathology students about their perception of online education. The positive and negative perceptions of the students were compared using the chi-square test (p < 0.05). Results: About 77% of the students (n = 85/110) responded to the survey. Female students (n = 43, 50.6%) had a significantly higher positive perception of online learning (p < 0.001); male students (n = 42, 49.4%) had a high negative perception of online teaching (p < 0.035). Nearly 70% of the students agreed that the Blackboard platform (Anthology Inc., Boca Raton, FL) made learning easy. About two-thirds of students agreed that the pre-lecture video produced by the teachers, when shared before the lesson, made the pathology lectures easy. Conclusion: Female students were more favorable toward online pathology learning. Extensive training provided to teachers can significantly increase the support given to students during online teaching.