E-Med News 22, December 2010 - Keele University

School of Medicine

MedNews 22 - December 2010

Contents

Visitors to Keele

Placement News

Undergraduate Update

External Conferences

Staff Development

News from Postgraduate Medicine

News from Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital (SaTH)

Staffs News

Student News

Hello and Goodbye

 

 

Inaugural lecture by Head of School

Professor Val Wass delivered the third lecture in the University's programme of Inaugural Lectures for 2010/11, on 16th  November.

The lecture, “Globalisation: the educational challenges of human diversity", explored her work on understanding how ethnicity impacts on student learning and achievement in the context of undergraduate medical education and socio-cultural learning theory.

A large audience, including many Medical School colleagues, members of Val’s family, and several PhD students whom she is currently supervising, attended the thought-provoking event in the Westminster Theatre.

When later asked if she had enjoyed the evening, Val confirmed that she had done so “once the lecture was over”!

 

Visitors to Keele

Vice-Chancellor Visits

October saw the University’s new Vice-Chancellor, Professor Nick Foskett, visit the Keele and University Hospital of North Staffordshire campuses of the Medical School.  Both formed part of a series of visits to the various Schools, Research Institutes and Directorates across the University, and gave the Vice-Chancellor an opportunity not only to meet with teaching and support staff across the School, but to hear about our activities, the development of the new curriculum and the challenges we face in the future. During his visit to the Keele campus, the Vice-Chancellor had an opportunity to look around a number of facilities available to the students including the IT Suite, the Multi-user Laboratories and our Anatomy facility, and to learn more about how we use those facilities across the curriculum.

The visit to the University Hospital of North Staffordshire campus and hosted by Mrs Julia Bridgewater, Chief Executive, Mr Rob Courtney-Harris, Medical Director and Mr Robert Kirby, Hospital Dean, provided the Vice-Chancellor with an opportunity to visit the newly refurbished Skills Laboratories and observe a series of demonstrations of some of the equipment used by the students including Ventriloscopes and SimMan.  Thank you to all the staff and students who took part, and who helped make both visits a resounding success.  The Vice-Chancellor will be visiting NHS partners in the near future.

Mrs Annette Machin – Undergraduate Manager

 

Geoff Norman visit to Keele

On the 26th July, Professor Geoff Norman spent the afternoon at Keele Medical School with staff from both the school and Primary Care Health Sciences Research Institute. He currently holds the Canada Research Chair in Cognitive Dimensions of Clinical Expertise at McMaster University.  

The focus of the afternoon was Learning in Medicine.  Prof. Norman delivered an interesting seminar from work on 'The Role of Experience in Clinical Reasoning'.  He reviewed evidence showing non-analytic reasoning to be a component of diagnostic reasoning at all levels from novice to subspecialist and in a wide range of disciplines from dermatology to cardiology to psychiatry.  He then concluded by examining the evidence that different instructional strategies based on this model of reasoning can enhance the accuracy of diagnosis.

The seminar was followed by a workshop including presentation and discussion of local research as well as the opportunity to further explore the potential implications for teaching which this cognitive perspective on learning brings.  As Prof. Norman’s primary interest is clinical reasoning, the thinking processes doctors use in arriving at a diagnosis, there was interesting discussion on developing a new curriculum which encourages development of both analytic and non-analytic based reasoning.

Local research findings were then presented by Ruth McEwen and myself. I discussed an aspect of my PhD research considering the similarities and differences in how students learn and make meaning from simulated and authentic early experiences.  I also raised the question of how these experiences might be used in comparison to enhance overall learning.  Ruth also focused on what happens in practice through discussing pilot data from videotaped student groups and considering the implications of unexpected findings for learning.

Dr Sarah Yardley - SpR in Palliative Medicine, North Western Deanery and PhD Candidate in Medical Education, Keele University

 

Jim Crossley visit to Keele

We were extremely honoured to welcome Dr. Jim Crossley to the School of Medicine on Tuesday 12th October. He is a Consultant Paediatrician at Chesterfield and also a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Sheffield. He is an expert in the area of assessment, especially workplace-based assessment (WBA), and he regularly advises the Royal Colleges on how to improve their assessments by observing what works and what does not work well in the workplace.  He spent the afternoon facilitating a number of workshops to help us start thinking along different lines.

His work has shown that clinicians who do WBA produce much more reproducible scores if the scoring scales of the assessment tool used are expressed in language that is intuitive to a clinician.   He emphasised the importance of allowing assessors to make global judgements, as they proved more valuable and reliable than statement checklists.  He cautioned against allowing the assessment metrics to become barriers due to the fact that descriptors can be rigid and limiting.  This has given us plenty of food for thought on ways in which we can improve the GeCoS (Generic Consultation Skills) tool which we currently use to assess students’ consultation skills.

I am sure we will be asking him for his expert opinion again in the not too distant future!

Dr M Mehta - Teaching Fellow

 

 

Placement News

Third Sector Placement Provider Conference

On Thursday 9th September, the Medical School hosted its first Third Sector Placement Provider Conference.  The conference was an opportunity for the school to formally acknowledge the contribution providers have made to the medical curriculum and for providers to meet school representatives, fellow providers and to learn more about the wider medical curriculum. We were delighted to welcome 33 delegates comprising of providers and representatives from the school.

Thank you to everyone who made the afternoon such a success; particularly Professor Val Wass, Dr Peter Coventry, Dr Simon Gay, Adam Thomas who were speakers and Sue Cartwright for her invaluable support with the administration of the conference and Sarah Philpott and the placements team for their support on the day

Helen Derbyshire – Placements Development Officer        

 

I had the great privilege of being asked to speak at the 3rd Sector Placement Provider’s conference at Keele medical school. Now in module 4, and my time as a student quickly disappearing, it was nice to be able to look back at the work I did with Age Concern while on Student Selected Component (SSC) in module 2.

For the SSC, module 2, I was placed with Age Concern at Bradbury House in Stafford. This facility not only provides the typical services within the wider community, but also has day centres for those suffering with dementia, and those needing rehabilitation following a fall.

During my time at Age Concern, I experienced the care they give from all angles and was made to feel part of the fantastic team they have. I was able to take part in activities at the falls centre, watch a concert put on by the newly formed choir of schoolchildren and age concern clients, and even practise a bit of medicine by checking blood sugars and pressures of the patients.

On the day of the conference, it was great to see so many people had made the effort to attend, especially to appreciate the work of the years below myself, whose posters were on display. It was also an opportunity to meet the other placement providers, with representatives as diverse as dDeafLinks to MEND (a sports, fitness and wellbeing organisation).

I talked about not only what I had learnt from my time at Age Concern, but also my colleagues’ experiences at other organisations.  However a real highlight of the conference for me was when Tracey Humphries, the Age Concern member of staff that had taken me on a day’s placement all the way back in Module 1 was present at the conference. She had recognised me during the meet and greet in the lobby, and it meant a great deal to me that she stood up after my contribution, and commented on how it had benefited her to see that the work she does in her day to day job had affected the choices and contributed to the education of a medical student. She added that she would encourage others to do the same.

I would like to take the opportunity to thank all the community third sector placement providers for their work, and to encourage any other organisations out there to offer their services do the same. The wider the choice of organisations available for the students to work with, the richer and more beneficial it will be to the generations of Keele medical students to come.

Adam Thomas – Medical Student Module 4

 

Farewell to Dr Singh

The Medical School was sad to hear of the sudden death of Dr Singh from Tunstall Health Centre on 4th August this year.  Dr Singh had been a placement provider for Keele undergraduate medical students for 3 years.  He had a single-handed practice in Tunstall for several decades before he appointed a partner in 2008, Dr Anil Sonnathi.  Dr Singh’s funeral took place on 13th August and was attended by GPs throughout the county, patients and medical students.


We publish below a selection of students comments, thoughts and fond memories of a placement with Dr Singh, as a tribute to him.

 

 

 

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“I had the pleasure of being attached to Dr Singh’s practice for two semesters with two different clinical partners and both occasions were my best GP placements.  Dr Singh was such a charismatic man with wonderful humour, kindness and realism.  I was privileged to get to know his family and was devastated to hear the news of his death.  His style of clinical practice is one I will never forget and I hope to be an ounce as successful as he was.  My fondest memories would be how he would consult babies and pretend they were adults, for example, a mother would bring in her baby with cold symptoms and Dr Singh’s humour would be to ask the baby if he had been out drinking the night before.  I am sure many of his students will never forget “come in please, sit down duck, how are ya?” as his ultimate catchphrase.  I was personally affected by this news as I felt close to him and his family.  I was blessed to have been able to pay my respects at his funeral, which incorporated a traditional Hindu cremation but still managed to have an element of his humorous side that will live and die with him. May he rest in peace and my thoughts lie with his family and Dr Anil Sonnathi.”

Dalia Yacob – Year 5 student


"I was fortunate enough to have Dr Singh as a mentor for a GP placement in Tunstall. During this time I found his advice, teaching and knowledge of primary care to be utmost. He was a well-respected physician and looked upon fondly by the community he cared for."

Lauren Jones – Module 3 student


“Dr Singh was a brilliant GP and the most relaxed man you could ever imagine. All his patients on my placement that I saw seemed to love him and had a great rapport with him. He was so patient and he always listened to what the patient had to say. The best thing about him though is that he always had a smile on his face and you could tell he was a man who always saw the positive side to life and enjoyed every minute. He was a great role model for me and even if I could be half a doctor he was I would be a very happy man!”

Asar Mushtaq – Module 2 student


“Dr Singh was a friendly man, with a good sense of humour. He was evidently enthusiastic about teaching & sharing his knowledge and experiences with the students he had on placement with him.  I recall him telling us all about his grandchildren, you could tell he was very proud of his family and loved them dearly.”

Rachael Jolley – Module 3 student


“Dr Singh had a unique ability to communicate with patients from all backgrounds and ethnic groups. His patients felt they were truly listened to and that their needs and concerns were Dr Singh’s first priority. He talked freely about his family and related his own experiences to that of the patient thus transcending any potential boundaries; his death will be a loss to the profession.”

Clare Wiseman – Module 3 student


“I was on placement for a morning with Dr Singh last year and from the few hours I spent with him it was clear that he was an approachable gentleman who cared dearly for his patients.  He seemed to have a great relationship with them and made each patient we saw feel at ease.  He provided myself with a fantastic placement, he was such a gentleman always trying to get me to think during his consultations and from my experience tried to engage students as much as possible.  He was a real gentleman and a great teacher.  He will be sadly missed.”

Adrian Craig – Module 2 student


“I had the privilege of meeting Dr Singh in the third year of the course during the SSC placement.  Recently, Dr Singh supervised my project option. He always gave me a warm welcome and made me feel comfortable.  I would never forget his cheerful 'hello'.  He displayed light hearted humour which formed the pinnacle of his personality.  He was kind, gentle and a witty person.

Dr Singh took great pride in teaching medical students.  A positive and a relaxed approach ensured that the students benefited from his experiences and knowledge.

Dr Singh will never be forgotten and it is sad that I never got to know him better.  It is clear from the turnout at the memorial service, Dr Singh was truly a legacy and he will be missed very much.”

Ali Rasool – Year 5 student

 

Undergraduate Update

Improving Feedback

Although we know that most medical students are very happy with their experience at Keele, we have received consistent messages that we could improve the quantity and quality of the feedback we give students after assessments.  The School takes this very seriously and indeed part of my job has been created to try to address these issues.

In the new course there have already been great efforts made to provide face-to-face feedback to students after the assessments.  Because of resources, it is inevitable that more resources have been focussed on students who are struggling.  However, we know that all students would like more feedback.  We are trying to address by using the latest technology – in the form of shiny new iPads!  We hope to use these in OSSEs and OSCEs.  This will make marking quicker.  More importantly, we will have opportunities to give much more detailed feedback.  We are aiming high; we want to provide the best feedback of any British medical school.  However, it will take quite some time to develop, as we have to develop software, along with our suppliers, which ‘talks’ to our other systems.  Please be patient, but we hope in time staff and students will see noticeable improvements.  If you have any suggestions of your own as to how we can improve feedback, I’d be delighted to hear from you.

Chris Harrison - Senior Lecturer in Medical Education

 

Medical Intercalated Degrees at Keele

The Keele School of Medicine (SoM) has focused intensively on the development of its Medical Intercalated Degree (ICD) programme in the past year. An ICD offers medical students the opportunity to suspend their medical studies for a year in order to obtain an additional qualification (Bachelor’s or Master’s degree). We believe that intercalation has key academic and career benefits and are therefore keen to support our medical students through this process.  The SoM faced the significant challenge of limited student uptake for ICDs in initial years - this was the subject of a survey in 2009 across the five undergraduate medicine years (conducted by Dr Caragh Brosnan and the Keele medical education team) which helped us identify the main causes underlying limited uptake, to inform our strategy for development of the ICD programme. Using data from this survey, Divya Chari (Coordinator for Medical Intercalated Degrees) made a presentation to the General Medical Council in April 2010, outlining the School’s strategy to evolve a Masters based ICD programme and its integration into the novel and innovative Medical Research Pathway (details can be found on the undergraduate medicine website) - feedback from the GMC panel members was invaluable in informing and refining our approach.

There have been significant encouraging developments in 2010, most notably a dramatic increase in student application numbers. Christian Mallen in Primary Care Sciences deserves special mention as he has been instrumental in introducing a range of MPhil projects in clinical departments (with some fee bursaries) that have proved extremely attractive to students. Notably, we have seen a sharp rise in student applications from external medical schools for Keele Masters programmes. Keele ICDs are represented on www.intercalate.co.uk, an external intercalation site maintained by students from Hull York Medical School, and the Keele Medical School will be represented at the Royal Society of Medicine Intercalation Fair, London in 2011. We have recently introduced an interview based process to make decisions regarding permission to intercalate - Kirsty Hartley in particular has worked extremely hard to coordinate the interview process and merits special thanks. We are continuing to expand and evolve the scope of the ICD programme with the recent introduction of a new MSc in Blood Science; we are currently exploring the possibility of introducing ICD courses from the School of Languages and the Centre for International Exchange and Development - such cross departmental interactions are key to the medical school’s philosophy of using multidisciplinary approaches to enhance the student learning experience. We have been successful in the past few years in raising £30,000 charity funding to support our intercalating students.

We recognise that a new medical school such as Keele will face significant challenges in the initial years of introducing an ambitious ICD programme. However, with the ongoing support of staff from all areas, we are confident that we can develop a successful and thriving programme at Keele; we consider such a programme will provide a solid foundation to meet the need for highly trained clinical academics and to support our graduates who will be entering competitive job markets in future years.

Dr Divya Chari, Coordinator for Medical Intercalated Degrees

 

Yale Update

This semester we have had a visiting scholar with us from Yale School of Medicine. Kristel Carrington came to Keele in September to research health policy and ethics with Dr Worthington as part of her MD. She focussed on childhood obesity and access to bariatric surgery (or gastric banding) for under 18s, comparing the UK with the USA. We wish her success for the future and are grateful for the teaching support she has given us at Keele.

In her own words, “I wanted something different. One of my major goals was to experience life outside of the US so when I heard of the opportunity at Keele, I jumped at it. I have only been here a few weeks but already, it’s exceeding my wildest expectations.”

In summer 2011 two more students will be heading over to Connecticut from Keele to do ethics research, and last summer four Keele students spent two months in residence at Yale, working on Year 4 projects and attending classes in bioethics.

(Keele ‘quartet’: Anna Price, Yvonne Abbey, Agnieszka Glazewska, and Dalia Yacob)

Many students on the exchange go on to publish findings and/or present their work at meetings. Furthermore, Anna Price, when she was interviewed for an academic F1 post at Birmingham wrote: "I felt that my time in the summer school and my research at Yale New Haven Hospital made me stand out as a competitive candidate. The Yale Programme has been fundamental in developing my future career plans in academic medicine and vital in securing an academic foundation programme. I thoroughly enjoyed my project option on the exchange and gained a lot from the experience." She was successful in her application and we offer our congratulations.

Roger Worthington hopes to expand the programme and link in with one or more schools in Europe.

Dr Roger Worthington - Lecturer in Medical Law & Ethics

 

National project - Substance Misuse in the Undergraduate Curriculum Project

This national project, which is funded by the Department of Health, has been rolled out across a number of medical schools including Keele, Dr Roger Bloor and Mr Steve Freeman who are both teaching fellows at Keele are running the project which will complete in the spring of 2011.

The overall project aims are described on the project website

”The Department of Health has now funded implementation and development phase of the curriculum in the English medical schools (24) with following aims:

I.    To complete and validate the toolkit and teaching and learning resources in order to advance the implementation programme.

II.    To work with medical schools to implement and evaluate the corporate substance misuse curricula.

III.    To enhance and equip medical schools to further develop and innovate substance   misuse learning in their curricula.”

Phase one of the project was completed in 2007 and resulted in the publication of a corporate guidance document on substance misuse in the undergraduate medical curriculum, ‘Substance Misuse in the Undergraduate Medical Curriculum’. An accompanying tool-kit document was also produced which was endorsed by the GMC and the CMO.

The document states three specific aims for undergraduate medical student education in substance misuse:

I.    Students should be able to recognise, assess and understand the management of substance misuse and associated health and social problems and contribute to the prevention of addiction.

II.    Students should be aware of the effects of substance misuse on their own behaviour and health and on their professional practice and conduct.

III.    Students’ education and training should challenge the stigma and discrimination that are often experienced by people with addiction problems.

Progress at Keele

We have undertaken mapping the curriculum with identification of both specific references to addiction and areas where it is feasible that this may be raised. There is some repetition of key words in the curriculum documentation; this reflects the progressive/building blocks approach where subjects are introduced and developed year on year. As an example a subject such as ‘Drug Therapy’ introduced in year 3 ‘Assessment’ would be developed in year 4 where the focus is ‘Intervention’.

An electronic survey tool, the University web site and key documents and reports are forming the basis of the data set at this stage.  It has been identified from addiction specific lectures that students have a significant level of pre-clinical knowledge with reference to addiction (e.g. mu receptors, effects of alcohol). This will be part of the scope for focus groups with students across years.

A semi-structured interview will be used to support comparability. An electronic survey will also be circulated to medical staff to assess where they deliver addiction related content (formal, informal, classroom, clinical area etc). The survey will also reflect the areas covered by the course-mapping matrix

We are grateful for the support given by staff and students for this project and look forward to reporting on the final outcomes in the New Year.

Dr Roger Bloor Teaching Fellow and Project Champion

Steve Freeman Teaching Fellow and Project Coordinator

 

External conferences

ASME Conference Cambridge July 2010

A strong contingent from Keele School of Medicine attended the ASME conference in Cambridge, providing an opportunity to reflect on our areas of interest and discuss topics with members from other medical schools.

Keele was strongly represented also in terms of presentations. The highlight was the award of “New Researcher Award 2010” to Sarah Yardley.  Her presentation was entitled “The consequences of participant conceptualisations of early experience: a qualitative exploration of faculty, student and placement provider interactions”.  In addition papers were presented by Bob McKinley, Lucy Ambrose, Stuart McBain, Laks Varadhan & Ruth McEwen and myself, with Steve Capey having a poster accepted. This was the first time I had presented at a conference and I was on a steep learning curve, the take home message being the lack of interest in the finer points of medical student access to clinical IT systems at tea time on a fine sunny day.

Apart from Sarah’s presentation, two workshops stand out in my mind.

1)    A presentation on risk management by the Medical Protection Society. The value of communication in reducing risk (this from a medico-legal viewpoint of avoiding litigation) was emphasized. This is certainly an area where the Keele curriculum is providing our graduates with excellent skills which will stand them in good stead for the future. The workshop also covered high risk doctors, those that had had a number of complaints; it was felt that work should be done early to remediate these doctors.

2)    Mindfulness workshop. This was run magnificently by a final year student and focused on the need to be aware of ourselves and our own needs bearing in mind the pressures we are under in the profession. Meditating on the lawn during the workshop was enjoyable, marred only by the moral dilemma of whether to wake a couple of the class who had fallen asleep.

I felt as a School both these workshops had relevance, that on mindfulness to consider fitting in some sessions within the curriculum on the concept mindfulness and stress reduction/meditation in the work place. Our students will be working in a busy environment where any decision they take may have significant consequences, and any steps we take to maintain their wellbeing throughout their career are important, in addition to ensuring a high level of clinical competence.

The evidence presented by the MPS showed that doctors who performed poorly as students were at higher risk of later litigation. In light of this evidence should we debate with the students how we deal with poorly performing students? As these are the colleagues they will be working with should they be part of the decision making process?

Dr R G Jones - Lecturer in Academic General Practice

 

Royal College of General Practitioners Annual Conference

I had heard so many wonderful things about Harrogate and so it was a pleasure to attend the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) Annual Conference there in October.  Three of our medical students (Nadia Kauser, Lucy Venyo & Sinead Hanley) also came along to enjoy the experience.

(Pictured: Dr Milan Mehta, Prof David Haslam, Lucy Venyo & Nadia Kauser from the student GP Society)

Our Head of Medical School, Val Wass, was there too and together we informed delegates about how Keele Medical School is succeeding in graduating excellent clinicians. We also managed to squeeze in a trip to the famous Betty’s tea rooms for some amazing tea and cakes!

We were lucky also enough to have a photo taken with Prof David Haslam (President of the RCGP) who will also be coming to Keele on Thursday 16th December to help launch our student GP society – so please come along and help support them! (Facebook link: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=346659426086).

Dr Milan M. Mehta - Teaching Fellow

 

Annual Conference took me into Space!

In June 2010, I attended the annual Medical School Secretaries’ Conference which was hosted by Leicester School of Medicine.  This is an event which I normally try to attend every year, as it is the one occasion when the majority of Medical School senior administrators get together.  We have a packed day of updates and a chance to reassure ourselves that we are not the only person coping with the stresses of daily life in a medical school!  We take it in turns to host the event, and on the first evening there is a dinner and a chance to relax before the following day’s conference.

The Leicester dinner was held at the National Space Centre, largely because the Director of Administration at the College of Medicine at Leicester, was one of the group who set up the Space Centre originally in 2001.  This was probably one of the most unusual venues for a dinner that I have ever attended.  The pre-dinner cocktails (of varying hues, bearing space-linked titles) were consumed after a trip in a lift up to the top of a tower containing a real space rocket, and we all enjoyed looking at the exhibition of space development through the decades.  There were plenty of cries of “look at those Kevin Keegan perms!” etc when looking at the photos.   Then we entered the planetarium for a short experience of flying through space, before dinner in part of the vast exhibition hall.  After dinner we were free to browse around the galleries and try out some of the interactive items.

The following morning after breakfast we rapidly settled down to a full programme including updates from the GMC and UKCAT,  views from the Medical Schools Council, a presentation on the organisation of theme-based research, and discussions on OSCE style interviews, NIHR funding, re-basing of SIFT funding, and Fitness to Practise.  During the lunch break, we walked to the nearby University Botanic Gardens for our traditional group photo.  Nearly all the UK Medical Schools were represented, and it was good to catch up with colleagues again.  In 2011 we are due to visit Glasgow – maybe in a year or two it will be Keele’s turn.

Margaret Hollins - School Business Manager

 

Staff Development

Educational Journal Club

The educational Journal Club is open to all teaching staff, both clinical and non-clinical and aims to increase awareness of current trends in medical education, by keeping up with the literature and assessing the impact on (educational) practice. Frequently we have a theme for the meeting which normally reviews three articles; group members will present an overview of a chosen article and then critically appraise it, which is then followed by a group discussion.

The next Journal Club meetings are on the 12th January and 9th March at 08:30 in the Medical School, Keele campus and last for one hour.


Medical Education Research Group (MERG)

The Medical Education Research Group (MERG) is open to all teaching staff, both clinical and non-clinical, and aims to facilitate educational research projects by a process of Peer Review. Before starting any research project there are a number of fundamental issues that need to be addressed. In common with all research disciplines, within the social sciences planning is crucial. The choice of research question and the method(s) employed will depend upon your epistemological standpoint and the assumptions that underpin the research question and study design. These can sometimes be problem areas for researchers who are often primarily clinicians.

MERG is the forum where researchers present their detailed outline research proposal and receive informal feedback from the group in a non-threatening environment. Frequently features of the study design including research methodology, setting, population, ethical concerns etc is refined. It is also the ideal venue for staff who are giving presentations at wider educational meetings such as ASME / AMEE etc to practise their talk and receive constructive feedback.

The next MERG meetings are on the 12th January, 9th February and 9th March at 10:30 in the Medical School, Keele campus and  last for 1½ hours.

To attend either of these groups, please email Mike Turner on m.o.turner@hfac.keele.ac.uk

 

Medical Student Assessment and Feedback - 13th April 2011

An interactive conference featuring key speakers and workshops

Professor Fiona Patterson (Cambridge)

will talk about situational judgement tests which are a type of psychological aptitude test that assesses judgement required for solving problems in work-related situations and are the latest in F1 and F2 recruitment

Doctor Adrian Freeman (Peninsula) will talk about feedback, especially student feedback following written assessment

Venue: Keele University Medical School, Keele University, Keele, ST5 5BG

Approved for 5 hours CPD

Registration: 09:00 - End: 16:30

Workshops include:

GeCoS, Educational Prescription, Giving Feedback, Workplace-based Assessments, Assessment in the Keele Curriculum

The conference fee is £115. There is NO CHARGE for clinical and non-clinical staff teaching Undergraduate students of the Keele Medical course. To request a registration form please contact Mike Turner at: m.o.turner@hfac.keele.ac.uk

 

News from Postgraduate Medicine

The West Midlands (North) HEIC is starting to take shape now with Postgraduate Medicine leading on the educational strands. Work on obesity and dementia, extremely important public health issues, continues and is extending our network into the local NHS economy. We are working with new partners at NHS Stoke on Trent and also within social care through our partnership with the Faculty of Humanities. 600 care home organisations have recently been written to under the Active Aging university theme to start a needs assessment for a learning package. We hope to develop activities, resources and blended learning packages around issues such as capacity and consent, and understanding the provision of the Mental Capacity Act

Also under the auspices of the HEIC we are building up resources to help support local GP commissioning. The challenge of the NHS White Paper 'Equity and Excellence: liberating the NHS' represents one of the biggest shake ups of the health system since the NHS was established. It has particular impact on primary care services but also on the interface between primary and secondary care. New skills, new ways of working and new ways of evaluating effectiveness of healthcare interventions will be needed.

The Clinical Leadership Academy goes from strength to strength. We now have 83 participants enrolled as full Keele students from primary care, acute services and mental health. These students will be contributing through their project work to enhanced local service delivery in their workplace, as well as developing a new skills set for the challenging times ahead.  An exciting new module is being developed called 'Advanced leadership: community engagement' which we hope will be the driver for catalysing third sector, charitable, industrial and patient projects.  Project work on this module will see participants really engaging with the communities in which they work to build sustainable partnerships between healthcare practitioners and the general population.

The National Leadership Council is looking for pilot sites to work up a national 'kite mark' for leadership training and we have been shortlisted as a potential first site.

Palliative care is another big area of development for us. The West Midlands SHA is running a 'Consultants with a Special Interest' programme, (CWASI) for consultants interested in developing expertise in end of life care. The MMedSci (named) route programme was chosen in open competition, to accredit this programme.

 

New Staff

Dr Charlotte Hart joined Postgraduate Medicine in August as the new Course Director of the Masters in Medical Education programme.  Charlotte's teaching career started off with undergraduate medical students as the Community GP tutor for Shropshire in 2003.  She then became a Programme Director on the Shropshire GP Vocational Training Scheme (VTS) in 2004.  During her time on the VTS she became the Assistant Director for Shropshire and Staffordshire and helped to develop a new trainers course for GPs which incorporated the Keele PG Certificate in Medical Education.  She is also a partner at a busy practice in Shrewsbury where she is a GP trainer.

 


The Keele Clinical Leadership Academy was launched on May 13 2010 by Sir Bruce Keogh, Chief Executive of the NHS and is a joint venture between the School of Public Policy and Professional Practice, and the School of Medicine.

In his major report, “High Quality Care for All – NHS Next Stage Review Final Report,1 Lord Darzi described the clinician’s future role as “Practitioner, Partner and Leader”1 and underlined the critical importance of effective clinical leadership to the delivery of future patient care.  This vision has been reinforced by the now acknowledged assumption that the NHS will have to make efficiency savings of between £15 and £20 billion over three years from 2011; in this endeavour, where there will be an overriding requirement to link efficiency to improving quality, “great clinical leadership is fundamental” to the innovative re-design of clinical services and consequent staffing efficiencies2

Co-directors Kay Mohanna and Jenny Cowpe have set up the Academy to foster excellence in clinical leadership by developing educational opportunities, carrying out and ultimately commissioning research and supporting practitioners in their workplace; enabling the development of clinicians as knowledgeable and effective leaders and facilitating the development of high performing clinical service teams.

The Academy has already won three commissions to run clinical leadership development programmes, in competitive tendering processes across the West Midlands at Heart of England Trust, Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health Foundation Trust and the Royal College of General Practitioners. We also look set to be selected by Kings College Hospital as well for its specialist registrar leadership development programme.

Dr K Mohanna - Director of Postgraduate Programmes


References

1.    Department of Health (2008) High Quality Care for All: NHS Next Stage Review Final Report, London

2.    Department of Health (2009) Implementing the Next Stage Review Visions: The Quality and Productivity Challenge (Letter from NHS Chief Executive Gateway reference 12396), London

 

West Midlands Deanery Update

Primary Care in general and practices in North Staffordshire in particular, have had a long and successful association with Keele Medical School.  The relationship has grown stronger year on year not only between the West Midlands Deanery and Keele but also with the local practices.  Many of our local primary care colleagues are involved in teaching and research at all levels within the Medical School.  I am proud to be part of that connection with Keele and value the close relationship.

Many of our training practices are also teaching practices for Keele Medical School. This raises further opportunities for us to work together especially for visiting the various practices for teaching and training approval.  Information and visits could be shared to improve quality and reduce duplication of work.  Medical student attachments to practices who previously did not or could not train has helped to introduce many new professionals to medical education.  Informal feedback from my own visits to practices has been very positive about the value clinicians have placed on teaching.  I am certain this will also play a part in the recruitment of new GPs into the area both from outside and from graduates of Keele Medical School.  It will in addition aid with retention of existing staff.  In fact teaching and training in most practices is truly a multi-disciplinary affair.

One of the big successes in North Staffordshire has been the MMedSci for GP trainees on the local vocational training scheme.  The West Midlands Deanery has committed substantial funds in allowing up to 24 trainees to attend the modules of the MMedSci.  These modules are closely aligned to the MRCGP curriculum, so that the benefits of attendance and engagement are seen very quickly by the trainees in their day to day practice.  Because of its success, we have decided to offer this by competitive application to all trainees in Staffordshire and Shropshire.

The other great opportunity which could change the face of primary care is extension of GP training to 5 years.  The current Chair of the RCGP is working very hard to convince the powers that be of the necessity of five year training.  Medical care is increasing in complexity on a daily basis.  More and more care that was traditionally secondary care based is now in primary care.  GP training needs to reflect this and we hope that in the not so distant future, the five years will be a reality.  This will allow us also to bring some radical and innovative changes to the way training is given to our future GPs.

Primary Care is constantly evolving and changing to the needs of the communities we serve.  This is what makes it so exciting and challenging and this is what we need to sell to our students and trainees.  We need to tell them that future is full of opportunities and a career in General Practice has the potential to fulfil much of what they aspire to both in their personal and professional lives.

Dr Amjad Khan – Area Director for GP Education in Staffordshire and Shropshire

 

Retirement of Lin Clark

Lin Clark retired in September 2010 after working as a secretary for Dr. Mike Fisher  (Area Director for G P Education)  for 11 years.

Starting initially as a temp, her post became permanent and after successfully applying for the post (and beating off some tough opposition!!)  Lin began full time employment with Dr. Fisher on 26th April 1999.

Although the West Midlands Deanery enforced many changes in policy and procedures over the years, Lin always dealt with these with a willing nature and a great deal of professionalism.

Following Dr. Fishers retirement in June 2009, Dr. Amjad Khan was appointed the new Area Director and Lin’s support and knowledge was a valuable contribution to Dr. Khan, which enabled him to quickly establish himself in his new role.

(Pictured (from left to right): Sue Cartwright, Margaret Bourke, Helen Derbyshire,

Janet McNicholas, Lin Clark, Ann Clowes, Sarah Philpott, Julie Wilde)

 

Lin is now thoroughly enjoying spending time with family and friends as well as being able to spoil herself!!

We wish her a long and happy retirement.

Mrs Karen Delay - P.A. to Dr. Amjad Khan

 

News from Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital (SaTH)

The annual SaTH 20/20 Cricket Festival was held in July.  Unfortunately the Managers team dropped out on the day but the coveted shield was strongly fought for between the Consultants, Junior Doctors and UGMS teams with the highly talented UGMS raising the shield after a well fought battle.  

Champion UGMS Team (missing from the pic are Tom Jones and Dr Martin Bassett)

 

The first of our pub quizzes was held on the evening of the 27th October at the Boathouse and a good night was had by all.  The victorious team of "Jupiter's Cock" won with a massive score of 40.5 out of 60.  Well done to everyone that took part.

Regular clinical dinners have taken place throughout the year and have included talks such as "Out of Africa" (Dr Mark Smith's experiences in Africa) and "Lords of the Ring" (a colorectal surgery talk by Mr Mark Cheetham).

Our infamous Winter Ball has been arranged for the evening of the 17th December and promises to be a great evening once again.

More info on our forthcoming social events can be found on our Facebook group "Keele Medics in Shropshire".

 

Staff News

Aspire Swimming the Channel Challenge

The Challenge:

Swim the English Channel and back again!! Well almost!

I set about the challenge of swimming the distance of the English Channel and back again – 44 miles – in my local swimming pool.

The challenge was over 12 weeks and meant swimming just under 3,000 lengths in total.

I am pleased to report that I completed the challenge in just under 9 weeks.

The event was to raise money for Aspire, a charity that supports people with spinal cord injuries.

To date I have raised £650.00 and the sponsorship money is still coming in.

Many thanks to all those who have sponsored me for this great charity event.

I feel I have well and truly earned my water wings!!!

Miss Kirsty Hartley - Education Office Manager

 

Medical School Cleaning Team Clean Up!

Commercial Facilities Management recently held a new initiative “Total Recognitiion”, to recognise individuals and teams worthy of specific praise.  Our fantastic cleaning team were voted Team of the Year, and some of the team are pictured below with their “Oscars”, and winners of individual awards.  Well done, ladies and gents!

 

Congratulations

Congratulations to Melanie Cartlidge, Undergraduate Manager at Mid Staffs who got married to Neil Woolliscroft at the Manor House Hotel in Alsager on 10th September this year.  Mel’s new email address is melanie.woolliscroft@midstaffs.nhs.uk

Achievements/Qualifications

Dr Lauren Brooks – Research Supervisor Training & Development Programme

MA Medical Education

PG Certificate

Jane Gray

Indira Natarajan

George Varughese

Maggie Bartlett

Ruth McEwen

Laks Varadhan

Diploma

Fahmy Hanna

Masters

Janet Lefroy


Dr Nilesh Gurjar who has completed his ILM Level 2 in Team Leading

 

Student News

KMSCC Career Fair November 2010

The Keele Medical Student Career Committee (KMSCC) held its 5th Career Fair on Saturday 13th November 2010. The day was a fantastic success with an excellent attendance of 127 students. We were especially pleased to see students in years 1 and 2 at the career fair, as it is crucial that students start looking forward to their future careers in order to prepare themselves fully in time for graduation and important career decisions that happen soon after this.

The career fair consisted of more than 15 stands, covering a range of specialties and career-related organisations and there were 8 structured sessions held throughout the day, providing information on careers in specific specialties, the Foundation Programme, electives and intercalated degrees.

Formal evaluation of the day was undertaken by 59 students and indicated that the day was viewed positively overall. This huge success is down to the hard work and commitment of the KMSCC members who worked tirelessly in the weeks running up to the event to organise the stands and speakers. We are also very grateful to the West Midlands NHS Deanery, the MDU, MPS, BMA and Wesleyan who sponsored the day. Their funding allowed students to get free refreshments, food and welcome packs. Thanks must go to the multiple professionals, organisations and students who provided representation and information on the day, many of whom gave up a significant part of their weekend for free, and to the School for supporting the event and providing the venue and caretaker cover.

If you are interested in becoming a KMSCC member so you can help to shape career support for Keele students, a re-launch meeting is being held at the CEC, City General Hospital site on Wednesday 1st December 2010 at 17:30. If you cannot make this please contact Lizzie Cottrell for further details ecottrell@doctors.org.uk.

 

Hello…………


Keele Campus

Dr Kevin Owens - Teaching Fellow in Academic General Practice - start date: 26 October

Dr David Blanchard - GP Education Facilitator - start date: 2 November

Dr Kimberley (Kim) Jensen - GP Tutor Post - start date: 22 November

Dr Catriona Kelly – Lecturer in Bioscience – Start date: 1st February 2011

Dr Alan Harper – Lecturer in Bioscience – Start date: 1st December 2010

Dr Sudipta Pal - Teaching Fellow – Start date 4th August 2010


UHNS Hospital Campus

Ms Jacky Adnams - Clinical Support Administrator - commencing 1st November 2010

Ms Kelly McArdle - Clinical Support Administrator - commencing 22nd November 2010.


Shropshire Campus

Dr Tahir Ali - Teaching Fellow in Anaesthetics

Dr Richard Morse – Teaching Fellow in Anaesthetics

Mr Joe McCloud – Support Tutor in Surgery


Postgraduate Medicine

Dr Charlotte Hart – Course Director of Masters in Medical Education (Lecturer)

Ms Sophie Hunter – Administrator for Masters in Medical Science


North Staffs Combined Healthcare

Dr Darren Carr - Support Tutor in Psychiatry, North Staffs Combined Healthcare

Dr Agnes Ayton - Support Tutor in Psychiatry, North Staffs Combined Healthcare

Dr Siraj Salahudeen - Support Tutor in Psychiatry, North Staffs Combined Healthcare

Dr Derrett Watts - Support Tutor in Psychiatry, North Staffs Combined Healthcare

Dr Dennis Okolo - Support Tutor in Psychiatry, North Staffs Combined Healthcare

Dr Xenofon Sgouros - Support Tutor in Psychiatry, North Staffs Combined Healthcare


Secondment

Jane Hunt, Clinical Skills Technician, recently obtained a one year secondment as International Assistant in the University's Centre for International Exchange and Development.  Emma Foxhall has been seconded to the post of Clinical Skills Technician for the period of Jane's absence from the School.  We wish both Jane and Emma good luck in their new roles, and we hear that Emma has settled in well already.

 

and Goodbye

London calling – Michelle Blunt

At the end of September Michelle left the Medical School obtaining a post as Placements Manager in the School of Nursing at the City of London University Hospital, after 6 years working for the School of Medicine and a total of 13 years service at Keele.

Since 2004, Michelle has provided support leading the Timetabling and Room Bookings team.  She has played a major role, in conjunction with IT, to develop our room booking and timetabling systems (Celcat) and continued to adapt the system to cater for the timetabling changes in relation to the needs of our developing curriculum.  Having to liaise with a wide variety of  users of our room booking resources at the UHNS Campus (Nursing & Midwifery, Postgraduate Medicine, UHNS trust), Michelle gained a vast knowledge of the requirements of our users and the subsequent demands and competing priorities for rooms which often called on her negotiation skills.  This in conjunction with our own programme of bookings, liaising with support staff, tutors, clinicians and academics certainly played a key part of her role.

We wish her well with everything in the future and thank her for all her hard work and support over the years.  Not only will she be sorely missed for her depth of knowledge she gained over the years but for her sense of humour, larger than life personality and sense of fun.  The office will not be the same without her!  

Mrs Karen Jackson – Deputy Undergraduate Manager (UHNS Campus)

 

London calling – Kim Parks

Not only was London calling for Michelle, but also for another member of the support team this time based on the Keele Campus – Kim Parks who left us in October for the bright lights of London.  Although she had only been with the School since July 2009, Kim still managed to make her mark, quickly settling in and gaining a reputation for being able to put her hand to any task which was asked of her.  Kim’s flexibility, versatility and cheerful nature will be sadly missed but what is the School’s loss is most definitely London’s gain!  We wish her well for the future.

Mrs Annette Machin – Undergraduate Manager

 

Dr Doug Corfield

Doug came to Keele as a Reader in Physiology in February 2003 with a commitment to the development of the new Keele School of Medicine. Keele were impressed with his educational and research expertise – the new School needed someone to take on responsibility for many aspects of systems Physiology not well represented in the rest of the University. Doug has a wide understanding of what medical students need to know and how they learn that material. He has impressive breadth of knowledge and has been excellent as the coordinator of the scientific basis of medicine curriculum theme. In addition Doug has co-led development of our new Module 4 (essentially year 4 of the Keele MBChB). This module finds students in clinical areas but with a responsibility to apply their scientific skills in their learning of clinical ones. Doug has been instrumental in this work, which has been very positively affirmed by the team from the General Medical Council, which is validating the Keele MBChB. Doug is able to command the interest and respect of teachers in all locations, an essential attribute for those committed to the full integration of undergraduate medical education.

Doug has just the right set of skills, both academic and in managing people, to take a lead role in his new role at Manchester. We hope that his experience at Keele will stand in him in good stead in a much larger School. Doug, at Keele, demonstrated his skills in diplomacy and persuasion as Chair of the School Ethics Committees, which has also involved him interacting with the University Committee and LRECs, and as co-Chair of the School’s Progress and Health and Conduct Committee. On the research side, he has been a Research Theme lead in our Research Institute of Science and Technology in Medicine. His university ‘citizenship’ is a credit to him and to the School.

Doug has been a great colleague to work with as the Keele School has grown and developed.  He has always been good at picking the important points to resolve without losing site of the details necessary for successful implementation of a new curriculum. We shall miss him greatly. Lucky Manchester!

Dr Lindsay Bashford – Director of Academic Undergraduate Studies

 

Dr Steve Capey

Steve came to the Medical School in February 2007 with expertise in pharmacology, an area that needed support, and a lively and passionate interest in medical education. The latter allowed him to commence an ambitious research programme under the watchful eye of our newly appointed Head of School, Richard Hays. His new post, at Swansea, will give him the chance to see the application of some of that research effort. Steve had a number of years service with the army before coming back to academic life. This has left him with some extremely useful attributes. He is an excellent planner who sets himself clear goals and reaches them efficiently and effectively. He has an excellent student-centred approach, always trying to recognise what their needs are. This is combined, however, with a tough love approach with those students who explore the edges of their professional responsibilities and occasionally stray over them. Steve has proved an outstanding deputy for our Academic Conduct Officer.

In terms of the Keele medical curriculum, Steve’s major achievement has been the development and implementation of Module 3 (year 3). He has played a lead role in its design, helped steer its approval through the GMC’s approval process, and led its delivery through a successful first iteration. As with all new curriculum developments there were ups and downs in that first run of module 3. The team has survived the stresses and is cracking on with the next iteration. I am sure the team will miss many of Steve’s admirable qualities.

Steve was always up for a challenge – particularly if it was sporting or athletic. His passion for cricket has survived all the attempts of the England team to suppress it. Twice he has achieved the Three Peaks Challenge with friends and colleagues from the School. It was so very reassuring to have a militarily trained mountain rescue expert (Steve) on our team, who appeared to saunter up and down ‘the hills’ as if he was out on a Sunday afternoon stroll. He took two members of staff to Mont Blanc this September for an even more challenging climb – is there no limit to his ambition and endurance? Steve is just the colleague you want to have on your side when the chips are down. He will be a real challenge to replace. Lucky Swansea!

Dr Lindsay Bashford – Director of Academic Undergraduate Studies