A review of clinical laboratory education, training and progression: historical challenges, the impact of COVID-19 and future considerations

Pearse, C and Scott, S ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0114-0246, 2023. A review of clinical laboratory education, training and progression: historical challenges, the impact of COVID-19 and future considerations. British Journal of Biomedical Science, 80: 11266. ISSN 2474-0896

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Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic had a wide global impact on society, including the clinical laboratory workforce. This historically underrepresented group of highly skilled professionals have now started to gain the attention they deserve. There had already been dramatic changes to laboratory training over the past two decades resulting from advances in technology, changes to service needs, and as a consequence of Pathology reform initiatives. The pandemic has had an additional impact. Higher education institutions and students adapted to emergency remote teaching. Clinical laboratories faced unprecedented challenges to meet COVID-19 testing demands and adjust to new ways of working whilst maintaining their usual high quality service provision. Training, assessment, and development arrangements had to convert to online platforms to maintain social distancing. The pandemic also had a global impact on mental health and wellbeing, further impacting learning/training. Despite these challenges, there have been many positive outcomes. This review highlights pre- and post-pandemic training and assessment for clinical laboratory professionals, with particular emphasis on Biomedical Scientists, outlining recent improvements among a history of challenges. There is increasing interest surrounding this vital workforce, accelerated thanks to the pandemic. This new public platform has emphasised the importance of quality diagnostic services in the patient pathway and in the response to national crisis. The ability to maintain a quality service that is prepared for the future is grounded in the effective training and development of its staff. All of which can only be achieved with a workforce that is sustainable, invested in, and given a voice.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	British Journal of Biomedical Science
Creators:	Pearse, C. and Scott, S.
Publisher:	Frontiers Media
Date:	12 April 2023
Volume:	80
ISSN:	2474-0896
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.3389/bjbs.2023.11266 DOI 1749964 Other
Rights:	© 2023 Pearse and Scott. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
Divisions:	Schools > School of Science and Technology
Record created by:	Jonathan Gallacher
Date Added:	14 Apr 2023 11:58
Last Modified:	14 Apr 2023 12:01
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/48744

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