GP Placement
At the start of their clinical training in Year 4, students have a two-week placement in General Practice. This gives students further experience of primary care, teaches the principles of history-taking/examination and introduces them to the primary care multi-disciplinary team.
During Year 4, students undertake attachments out of Oxford at hospitals in Reading, Swindon, Northampton, Slough and High Wycombe/Stoke Mandeville. During this time, they to spend three sessions receiving Primary Care teaching from a GP Tutor, usually in the GP's own practice. These sessions help develop students' clinical skills as well as exploring components such as psychosocial impact of disease and medical professionalism.
The core Clinical Communication Skills course is delivered in Year 4 (GE2). Additional cross curricular clinical communication skills teaching occurs in year 5 (GE3) on the Psychiatry, Population Health and Women’s and Reproductive Health placements.
The sessions are run as small groups, facilitated by a clinician tutor working with a simulated patient. Learning is shared and supported through role play and feedback. The sessions are set to offer increasing levels of challenge as the students’ progress through their clinical course. We also offer individual support for students who require additional input with their communication skills.
The Evidence Based Medicine (EBM) Special Study Theme (SST) is delivered across Hilary and Trinity Term to Year 4 undergraduate medical students. This module provides students an opportunity to apply their EBM skills and get practical experience developing their own systematic review. Through hands-on workshops and an online training programme, students will form groups to develop a research question and work through the steps to create a study protocol. Students will be supported over the coming months and years to get their systematic review to publication and are offered opportunities for conference presentations, posters, awards, and publications.