Table 2 Examples of learning
Experience | Learning | Translation to NHS context |
|---|---|---|
Familiar practice in unfamiliar contexts | ||
A different approach to medical student learning. ‘Somali system …. was a much flatter system, they were all pretty equal and they were sharing skills and obviously the more junior ones had more to learn than the more senior ones but it was very much a sharing insights and sharing skills.’ | Peer teaching as engaging and informative. | Encouraging junior doctor to student interaction for teaching on NHS ward rounds. |
Alternative solutions to familiar problems | ||
Observing a midwife breastfeeding the baby of an acutely ill mother following post-partum haemorrhage when no formula is available. ‘The mother was too unwell, she'd lost too much blood, and couldn't breastfeed or anything, so the midwife just took the baby and put the baby onto her breast, and fed the baby.’ | Alternative solution to a familiar problem. ‘They don’t have formula…. thinking outside the box, it wasn’t acceptable here because everything would need to be screened and tested, yet probably saved that baby’s life at that point.’ | ‘Forcing you to think outside the box, to not be constrained necessarily by guidelines and protocols. I’m not saying that you should do it on the wards here, but feeling able to be open minded and broad minded, that that there are actually other ways around things.’ |
Learning about Somali culture | ||
The role of relatives in the consultation. | Increased awareness of alternatives to the individual focus of consultations in UK culture to an appropriately family-centred approach | ‘You know sometimes you have to give the medication to the relatives and just keeping it at the back of my mind and thinking is it different the way we do it here or the way we do it in Somaliland it was a knowledge that I carried with me …. which one is better how can I apply, how can I improve you know.’ |
Increased responsibility | ||
Leadership role on second trip to Somaliland despite being the least senior healthcare professional as they had previously been to Somaliland. ‘As a [younger person] managing people in their 40s or their 50s it’s not difficult, just you had to be able to talk to them in a way that they didn’t find you being patronising.’ | Leadership skills. | ‘I felt more confident to come back and my manager had been asking me to lead the ward for quite a while. And I felt more confident to come back and do that.’ |
Interacting with senior government officials. | Skills to communicate interprofessionally with colleagues in more senior roles. | Improved professional communication skills and confidence. |
New working relationships | ||
Working in an unfamiliar and sometimes stressful environment helped to facilitate new working relationships | Interprofessional support from UK colleagues. | Improved interpersonal relationships with colleagues from other disciplines when working in the NHS. |
New working relationships with Somali colleagues ‘Then in the afternoon, we’d go to the hotel, in the courtyard, to talk. And it was through talking and just social chats with the [Somali] lecturers.’ | Alternative healthcare professional cultures | Understanding a different professional culture |