A patient-centered evaluation of a novel medical student-based patient navigation program.

The program was a single-site pilot, so the results may not apply to other clinics, populations, or navigation models. Patients were chosen because they had missed appointments or known barriers to care, so they may have been more likely to value navigation than a general patient group. The authors note no head-to-head data comparing student navigators to others, so the study does not show whether students performed better or worse than nurse or lay navigators. The study measured patient experience, not direct disease outcome measures. Only 44 of 71 contacted patients responded, so patients who did not respond may have had different experiences. Contact varied widely, with some patients having weekly contact and others only a few interactions, and the study did not evaluate each navigator separately. Patient experience answers tend to be positively skewed, so high satisfaction may overstate how helpful the program was.

The program was created in response to a 2021 grant from Aurinia Pharmaceuticals, and five sites were awarded $50,000 to implement a patient navigation program. The authors declared no competing financial interests or personal relationships.

Do not conclude that medical student navigation improves lupus outcomes or is better than nurse navigation. The study measured patient experience only, and the authors note no head-to-head data comparing student navigators to others.