Open AccessDistance Education in Veterinary Medicine: History, Current Situation, and Future Perspectives (a Systematic Review)
Author(s) -
José Miguel Velásquez Salazar,
Maurizio Miglino
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
ead em foco
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2177-8310
DOI - 10.18264/eadf.v12i1.1635
Subject(s) - distance education , scopus , process (computing) , veterinary education , covid-19 , pandemic , medical education , face (sociological concept) , veterinary medicine , medicine , medline , computer science , political science , psychology , sociology , curriculum , mathematics education , pedagogy , social science , disease , pathology , infectious disease (medical specialty) , law , operating system
Technology has revolutionized education making it more accessible, overcoming time and space barriers, and reducing costs for undergraduates and professionals. In veterinary medicine as well as in other knowledge areas, distance education has evolved, going to the forefront of technological advances. Today, many tools, courses, and online platforms are available to facilitate and enhance the teaching-learning process for institutions and students. However, because of the Covid-19 (Sars-CoV-2) pandemic, educational institutions and veterinary medicine students around the world were forced to use distance education tools, many of them without being prepared or knowing the tools available or not having the necessary tools. In this sense, seeking to offer students and educators information about the evolution of distance education in veterinary medicine, its current situation and available tools, it was made a systematic review using the databases Science Direct, Scopus and Google Scholar, gathering more than 244 journal articles, and finally 116 articles were selected. The selected articles were analyzed for the history, platforms, and resources available, difficulties, current situation, and future perspectives, as well as the advantages and need of distance education in the actual pandemic situation. We can conclude that distance education is currently an indispensable tool in veterinary medicine, complementing face-to-face courses and reducing costs. This has led to the development of several platforms, applications and online educational resources that facilitate and enhance the teaching-learning process for educational institutions, veterinary students, and professionals.Keywords: Online learning. E-learning. Distance learning. Digital tools. Veterinary education.