The Shadow of COVID-19 on Medical Education at Tehran University of Medical Sciences in 2020

The outbreak of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has had a major effect on medical education at Tehran University of Medical Sciences. Although we are confronted with the disease challenges including university recess, cancellation of all face to face sessions, and postponement of the exams, we observe a paradigm shift towards ‘institutional culture’ transition in medical education. However, we know not everything is rosy and glassy; we are going to present the opportunities created in this situation in both classroom and clinical settings at our university. In classroom settings, two considerable changes have taken place following the outbreak of the Coronavirus taken from face to face to virtual learning and from round tables to networking. While we felt we had failed to incorporate e-learning in the undergraduate medical curriculum (1), after the outbreak of Coronavirus we faced a huge number of requests for using LMS (Learning Management System) and other virtual learning platforms. Besides the replacement of Face to face learning with virtual learning, interactive learning and collaboration are taking place in a variety of virtual communities and social media platforms, including Skype, Tritapp, and Mendeley by networking instead of round tables.