Looking Back on Digital Medical Education Over the Last 25 Years and Looking to the Future: Narrative Review (Preprint)

Abstract

BACKGROUND The last 25 years have seen enormous progression in digital technologies across the whole of the health service, including in medical education. For some, digital medical education may seem to have been a brief aberration imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the rapid evolution and utilisation of online and digital techniques have been significantly transforming this field since the beginning of the new millennium. These continue to rapidly progress even since the resolution of the pandemic. OBJECTIVE This review aims to outline the striking developments that have taken place in digital health education over this time frame around the world. The learners covered will include medical students, doctors in training or continuing professional development, nurses, paramedics, and also patients. METHODS Literature reviews were carried out to support this review using PubMed, Web of Science Core Collection, Scopus, Google Scholar and Embase. RESULTS Evidence of the significant steps in the development of digital medical education in the past 25 years is presented and analysed in terms of application, impact and implications for the future. CONCLUSIONS Major changes and developments in digital health education have occurred since the start of the new millennium. Whilst many of these changes are currently being widely utilised in education, others, such as Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality, and Artificial Intelligence, provide great potential for the near future. CLINICALTRIAL Not applicable