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Background: Institutions of higher learning are persistently struggling with issues of academic dishonesty such as plagiarism, despite the availability of university policies and guidelines for upholding academic integrity. Methodology: This was a descriptive qualitative study conducted on 37 students of a Healthcare Ethics course at an Australian tertiary institution from February 2016 to October 2018. The purpose of the study was to explore the reasons for plagiarism detected the Turnitin® plagiarism checking software and extensive review of manuscripts. The interviews were conducted in private rooms and in strict confidence. Thematic analysis was manually done. Results: Four major themes namely, lack of interest; pressure of time with competing priorities; lack of understanding of the policy on academic honesty, and "the determined students" were identified. Sub themes under lack of interest were lack of preparation and effort, low self-efficacy, poor studying techniques, and convenience of internet sources. Under pressure of time, the subthemes were, misplaced priorities, procrastination, high workloads, poor planning, competing interests, and the perception of availability of time at the start of the semester. Regarding lack of understanding of the policy on academic honesty, the subthemes identified were, lake of awareness of plagiarism, lack of awareness of acceptable similarity, conflicting messages from tutors and confusion with high school learning. The determined students were those that either made all effort to reduce plagiarism but still remained high, used the another language at home other than English, had poor paraphrasing techniques or lacked resources for English language editing. Conclusion: There are varied and diverse reasons for plagiarism. There is a need to systematically reinforce and educate students on issues pertaining to academic dishonesty and their associated implications.

Introduction: The World Health Organization (WHO) advocates for the strengthening of education and training in infection prevention and control (IPC) in higher educational institutions (HEIs). This is fundamental to ensure health science students are confident and competent in clinical practice. Aim: Explore the preparedness of undergraduate health science students for IPC practice. Search strategy: The PubMed, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, EMBASE, ProQuest, Scopus, Web of Science, ClinicalKey, and Google Scholar databases and grey literature will be searched for relevant articles. Inclusion criteria: Quantitative, and mixed methods studies on teaching and learning, technological methods, strengths and limitations, and challenges of IPC practice in HEI undergraduate curricula. Participant characteristics: Undergraduate health science students including medical, nursing, pharmacy, dental, physiotherapy, radiology, medical imaging, and paramedicine. Setting and time frame: Studies published anywhere in the world, in English, and from 2010 to 2023. Search terms: Preparedness, health science students, infection prevention and control, technology, higher education institutions. Data extraction: The data extracted will be recorded on a data extraction form. Assessment of risk of bias: This will be conducted according to the criteria outlined in the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions. Ethics and dissemination: No ethical approval was required for this protocol. Interim findings will be presented at relevant local and international conferences and a manuscript will be published in a peer reviewed journal. Discussion: This systematic review will provide a baseline for recommendations for developing innovative ways to improve IPC teaching and learning in HEI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Institutions of learning have been disrupted globally with serious implications for clinical teaching for students of health professions. The purpose of our study was to explore the perceptions of students towards online clinical teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic at Fatima College of Health Sciences. This was a descriptive qualitative study conducted on a purposive sample of 25 students from 24 June to 30 August 2020. The sample size was determined by data saturation. These were mainly nursing students in their 2nd to the 4th years of study. Students are required to have experiences, of stipulated nature and duration, in various specialty clinical settings throughout the clinical years of their programs. Approval for the study was granted by the Fatima College Research Ethics Committee (approval number: INTSTF010BSN20). The research was conducted according to the requirements of the Declaration of Helsinki. Data were collected through online semistructured questionnaires. Prospective participants were sent a soft copy of the informed consent document, and consent was indicated by clicking an "agree" link on the page that took them to the questionnaire. All participants were informed of their freedom to either participate in the study or not, without any penalty and were assured of their confidentiality. The questionnaires were kept in a password-protected file to which the researchers had sole access. Manual thematic analysis was done following the stages of organisation, familiarisation, transcription, coding, developing a thematic framework, indexing, displaying, and reporting. The major themes identified were the unfamiliar experience, challenges of online clinical learning, and possible solutions. Challenges of online clinical learning are multifaceted and require concerted multidisciplinary efforts to resolve. Nursing institutions, ours included, must develop flexible education systems that will be able to thrive in crisis and other unforeseeable circumstances., Competing Interests: All authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2023 Jean Mukasa et al.)