Burnout from accommodating learners with special needs in rural community teaching sites: fact or fiction?

Dr Sarah Strasser, NOSM, Canada*

Diversity in the health human workforce is an aspirational goal, deemed to provide a higher level of patient centered care in traditionally underserved populations. Accreditation of medical schools includes review of diversity of faculty and students. Human rights demand equity within programs for learners with special needs. Although special needs of learners can be identified and managed at admission, when special needs develop in learners post admission this can impact on rural programs.

Accommodating learners with special needs is a challenge for any medical education program. In rural medical education and training the challenge is heightened because of the potential lack of anonymity, the relative lack of resources and isolation. However if these challenges can be addressed in rural areas the solutions are likely to have a wider positive impact on mainstream programs.

If maximum personal benefit is gained from learning how to overcome challenges, whereas clinically this is a source of professional pride for rural doctors, can this be translated to rising to the challenge of teaching learners with special needs? What are the perceived risks? Do these outweigh the potential benefits from accommodating learners with special needs in rural teaching sites?

Can we make learning with special needs in rural communities a strength? The reputation of teachers in rural programs is to be creative and flexible to meet the needs of individual learners. When rural doctors are already under pressure of service, in accommodating learners with special needs, do rural programs and preceptors run a greater risk of burnout than benefit from the process? What can we do at the program level to better support all teachers and learners in the rural setting?

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