Teaching Advocacy Through Community-Based Service Learning: A Scoping Review

Advocacy has been identified as a core element within the practice of medicine and thus a key component to medical education. However, there are challenges regarding teaching and evaluation of advocacy within medical education. Community-based service learning (CBSL) has emerged as a valuable educational tool to foster knowledge and skills related to advocacy. CBSL is particularly relevant to psychiatry, given the extent of engagement with underserved communities and opportunities to advance learning in these environments. A scoping review was conducted to identify current educational strategies and outcomes related to advocacy training among medical learners in the context of CBSL.

Between July and October 2019, the authors searched PsycINFO, MEDLINE, Embase, ERIC, Web of Science, Scopus, and ProQuest for English language literature with no date limits and retrieved 2,813 articles and abstracts; 68 were included in this review. Two reviewers independently screened articles and extracted data. Data were then charted, analyzed, and discussed with the research team.

Seven key themes related to approaches to advocacy education were identified: (1) type of community partner; (2) populations served; (3) program participants; (4) program structure; (5) evaluation of learner outcomes; (6) sustainability; and (7) challenges and limitations.

This scoping review provides insights into the variety of CBSL-based advocacy program formats and evaluation methods, which is of particular importance to psychiatry. There is heterogeneity in the methodology by which CBSL is implemented and how outcomes are measured. A list of recommendations for future areas of inquiry is provided.