Postgraduate Taught

The emphasis of this course is to stretch participants – to develop further, scholarly knowledge and competence over and above the important clinical and professional teaching within the Foundation Programme. The award aims to build on and augment this teaching. The areas to be studied are covered by the headings in Good Medical Practice from the General Medical Council, and these headings are how we have organised this award.

In order to do well in this award participants will need to attend all the Foundation Programme teaching. In addition we have scheduled extra sessions over the two year programme for further support and some additional teaching. This will include study skills support and opportunities for student led teaching, presentations, seminars and discussion groups.

The academic programme will allow participants to:

1. Demonstrate how they have reflected on their clinical experiences and teaching opportunities to extend the breadth and depth of learning
2. Demonstrate a proactive approach to planning and consolidating learning activities
3. Show how they have synthesised all sources of learning and transferred this into their professional practice to impact on patient care
4. Distinguish themselves from their peers in the competitive ST1 application process

This programme is only intended for medical graduates, currently engaged in medical practice on the foundation programme.

The Keele Postgraduate Award in Foundation Medical Practice is a 30 credit module that can also be used to build towards a full masters award. In common with other postgraduate courses at Keele, this offers flexibility and the ability to transfer M-level credits between courses, subject to individual course regulations. For example these 30 credits can be directly transferred into the Masters of Medical Science (MMedSci) award.

The Keele Foundation Programme taught component for all trainees is delivered by both clinicians and academic teaching staff on a day release format. The added element for students enrolling on this award will add a private study, reflective learning component to the existing teaching and learning activities without requiring any more time out of practice. Additional study skills support and some teaching will be given in small groups, with one or two facilitators. Most teaching is based on interactive small group methods, interspersed with practical tasks. Students are asked to contribute their own views and experiences, either informally during group discussions or by giving short presentations to the group. Year One: The teaching programme in the Foundation School follows a spiral curriculum based broadly on Good Medical Practice. These outcomes for full registration have been developed by the GMC from The New Doctor (2007).

Year Two: The second year of the Foundation Programme builds on the first year of training. The main focus is on training in the assessment and management of the acutely ill patient. Training also encompasses the generic professional skills applicable to all areas of medicine - team work, time management, communication and IT skills.

Teaching Units

The following six teaching units are spread over two years:

Unit One: Good clinical care

Unit Two: Maintaining good medical practice

Unit Three: Teaching and training, appraising and assessing

Unit Four: Relationship with patients

Unit Five: Working with Colleagues

Unit Six: Probity

The Foundation Programme outcome is a portfolio of evidence that the trainee has met the Foundation Programme competencies and includes workplace based assessments.

The academic credit will build on this by further assessing six key areas of Good Medical Practice from the GMC:

• Good clinical care,

• Maintaining good medical practice,

• Teaching and training others, 

• Relationships with patients,

• Working with colleagues and

• Probity.

Assessments will include but not be limited to scholarly essays, audits and evaluation of student led teaching sessions.