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I was aware of this flu like disease originating in Wuhan, China from the TV news in December 2019. I suspect like many others I did not think it would particularly affect my life and if I had thought about it, I think I probably thought this would be like SARS and similar threats and not be as bad as journalists were suggesting, how wrong I was! COVID-19 entered my work life in early February, many of our fourth year students go on elective to SE Asia and we had to make decisions about whether they could travel or not. All too quickly, it was deciding our returning students must quarantine before seeing patients.
The School (Figure 1) prepared to move teaching and assessment on line as lockdown approached. One of the biggest challenges was communication with the students, how to keep them in the picture when you did not know what the future held yourself.
My NHS colleagues were great letting a number of university staff including me ‘look after the students' as they started to provide emergency care in the Charles Clifford Dental Hospital. Fortunately, I had just replaced my 10-year-old laptop with a new one, which meant I had the technology for working from home.
Online meetings and recording lectures all became the normal. Although in my head I think, I have the on-camera skills of Emily Maitliss, it turns out I do not.
The much harder challenge was delivering valid, deliverable assessments remote assessments to over 600 undergraduate and postgraduate students across 10 degree programmes. This revolutionary change was achieved in under 3 months thanks to the work of so many people.
I liked, and continue to like, working from home, but it was good to return to clinical work towards the end of May. On the first day back, the walk into work through very empty streets was eyrie. Stranger still was turning up to do a job I have done for years, but not being comfortable because so much was new. I imagine many Dental Update readers had the same experience.
We were the first Department in the University to resume face-to-face teaching in August. The preparation to ensure this could be delivered safely was challenging. Students returned and started with clinical skills refresher courses before commencing seeing patients again.
I have focused on the clinical students, but dental schools consist of a much larger community. Over the past year, the School has progressed its masters and PhD students by opening research laboratories again in a staged and safe way. These students have had a particularly tough time. Staff of course have their own research, and this has also suffered.
Dental schools have probably been hit hardest of all university departments, and many challenges remain, but I am certain there are many things we will do better because of what we have learned over the past year. Finally, I want to take this opportunity to thank all the staff and students of the School of Clinical Dentistry, University of Sheffield, and the Charles Clifford Dental Hospital for their hard work, resilience and can do attitude.