Medical teacher
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New challenges for clinical teachers include incorporating a deeper appreciation of the use of the published literature in day-to-day practice and teaching, responding to the profusion of diagnostic tests and treatments, and dealing with changing practical difficulties. We report a summary of a retreat conducted by our Department of Medicine in which our faculty presented and refined strategies they had developed to deal with these challenges. Areas of discussion include developing an effective medical team managing time on a busy clinical service, teaching pathophysiology, teaching clinical skills, and teaching critical appraisal. Our observations are likely to be useful to clinicians involved in patient-centred teaching in wards and clinics, particularly those interacting with groups of undergraduate and post-graduate trainees.
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New concern about the psychosocial development of medical students has resulted in a call for closer relationships between faculty and medical students. This review examines the literature on advising programs in medical schools and on mentoring generally to develop a better understanding of how faculty and students might interact. Innovative advising programs are discussed within the context of current thought about the value and structure of mentoring relationships.
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Medical education nowadays experiences an increasing gap between the potential didactic value of educational technology and the practical implementation thereof. One of the important obstacles is the tendency to separate media and media agencies from staff development. ⋯ For example instead of only offering technical audio-visual production services, medical teachers are also taught how to use different media effectively in teaching and learning. In this way media are directly related to staff development.
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The first major intake of medical students who studied the new GCSE occurred in Autumn 1990. These students have experienced a range of student-centred educational approaches to learning, but medical education in the UK remains committed to teacher-centred approaches. ⋯ An innovative course in medical sociology at the University of Sheffield is reported, which illustrates student-centred learning approaches including transferable activity-skills development and self-assessment profiling. An innovative approach to course evaluation is discussed.