The Benefits of Longitudinal Relationships With Patients for Developing Health Professionals

Clinical placements are widely acknowledged as essential to the holistic development of health professionals, with the ability to engage in professional practise in patient-centred healthcare models providing one example of this holistic development. These placement experiences have historically involved a series of short-term rotations between hospital-based disciplines, continuous with or interspersed between short blocks of theoretical learning. While the studentclinician (preceptor) relationship is central to student learning outcomes, these short-term placements often offer students little opportunity for developing relationships with patients, or for continuity of care experiences. Investigation of an alternative clinical education model for medical students, the longitudinal integrated community-based clerkship, has revealed that patients are important participants in the patient-student-preceptor triad that develops. In this chapter we present patient, student and preceptor narratives to illustrate how longitudinal relationships between students and patients can play a significant role in the student journey to “becoming” a patient-centred health professional.Judith Nicky Hudson and Kathryn M. Westo