New era with new technology: Medical education future in public health emergency coronavirus disease 2019 with innovations: An experience from Eastern India

Abstract Online teaching was an attractive option during coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic. Appropriate use of technology compensated for usual offline teaching methods of taking lecture sessions and their assessment. Current article explores utilizing technology in imparting lectures to undergraduate students and their judgments through assessments. Efforts were made to gauge interest and obstacles incurred in the due process of learning by taking feedback. This was a cross-sectional study conducted on fifth-semester students (MBBS Batch 2018) via a virtual platform. A lecture session on “Growth and Development of an Under-5 Child” was conducted through Google Meet, which also included an assessment through which student’s learning was appraised using crossword, pictorial, multiple-choice, and situation-based questions. Feedback and areas of improvement were taken at the end. We found that 16.8% scored 88% marks, and 60.2% scored 94% for crosswords. Two pictorial questions got only 1.5% and 13.8% correct answers, respectively. Some suggestions obtained as feedback were more interaction with students, more multiple-choice questions after the lecture, proper class scheduling, reducing time of academic sessions, and including questions during lecture course instead of giving them after lecture. Students were comfortable using technology to conduct a class and its assessment.