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Medical Education

Student Projects

Medical Education welcomes medical students who wish to pursue their BMedSc/MMedSc research project with us. We offer Year 3 projects in a range of fields (though not all fields are available in each academic year):

Please note, staff change, grants are awarded and research interests evolve over time, so the topics in which research projects are being offered within Medical Education are subject to change also. However, we are always happy to discuss students own ideas for a study. Please get in touch with us and collectively we will try to accommodate your ideas.

If you would like to see a sample of past projects, please get in touch. 

Undergraduate medical students at Southampton regularly take part in ASME and undertaking a research project is not the only way to get involved. For example, students regularly feed into the design and evaluation of programmes and course components. Moreover, students also regularly contribute to staff development events. If you aren’t ready to commit to a project, but would like to get involved, please get in touch with Martina Johnson.

Students are supported on their projects through close supervision by Medical Education staff members. We also organise events specifically for students, where everybody gets a chance to present and discuss their work in progress, raise issues around research methods and research ethics. These sessions also enable students to seek and receive advice and feedback from members of staff (other than their own supervisor) and to practise their presentation skills ahead of the conference.

We are also keen to support students who wish to present their work at national and international conferences and/or to publish their work in relevant journals. Some examples include:

  • In July 2019 at the ASME Annual Scientific Meeting in Glasgow, Melissa Anane presented "Undertaking paid employment whilst at Medical School", which explored differences in employment and experiences of employment whilst at Medical School between students from widening participation backgrounds compared to non-widening participation students (supervisor: Sally Curtis).
  • In June 2017, at the ASME Annual Scientific Meeting in Exeter, Saleh Jawad presented on the “Effectiveness of resilience training on the mental health of medical students and doctors” (supervisor: Siobhan Lynch).
  • At the 2016 Annual Scientific Meeting of ASME in Belfast, Lauren Cairns’s findings from: “An exploration of students’ experiences of the PPD pre-arrival task: Its feasibility and impact” were presented (supervisors: Anja Timm & Siobhan Lynch; at the same conference Tara Ludhra presented a poster on her research titled ‘Medical Students’ Perceptions of and Engagement with the Bio-Psycho-Social Model’ (supervisors: Kathy Kendall & Selma Omer); Beth Leggett (supervisor: Sally Curtis); and Jingy Alom (supervisor: Sally Curtis).
  • Mahdi Nazar’s project was published in Medical Teacher, 37(4): Nazar, M., Kendall, K., Day, L., & Nazar, H. (2015). Decolonising medical curricula through diversity education: lessons from students. DOI: 10.3109/0142159X.2014.947938 (supervisors: Kathy Kendall & Larry Day)
  • In 2015 at ASME’s Annual Scientific Meeting in Edinburgh, Stephen Collins presented a paper on “How do medical school applicants respond to the requirement for 'work experience'? An exploration of 'going abroad'” in a panel on admissions (supervisor: Anja Timm). At the same event, Claire Eickhoff presented a poster entitled: “Does working as a Healthcare Support Worker in year 2 make a difference to how medical students adapt to working and learning on wards when they enter year 3?“ (supervisors: Louise Dubras & Deborah Rose) Amit Motwani also presented an e-poster on ‘Medical Education and Mobile Phones’ (supervisor: Sunhea Choi).

2015-2016. Harleen Johal ‘Ethical Decision-Making around Serious Self-Harm by Professionals in a Forensic Adolescent Mental Health Unit’ (supervisors: Kathy Kendall and Angela Fenwick)

Harleen presented a poster titled ‘Ethical Decision-Making around Serious Self-Harm by Professionals in a Forensic Adolescent Mental Health Unit', at the Institute for Medical Ethics at the Institute for Medical Ethics 11th Annual Spring Conference in London, February 2017.

2015-16. Jonathan White, ‘Why are there so few working-class applicants to medical schools? Learning from the success stories’ (supervisor: Sally Curtis)

An annual prize of £150 is awarded for the best student research project conducted and supervised within Medical Education.

In recent years, the Jan Schmedlin prize was awarded to the following students:

  • For the academic year 2016/17 to Saleh Jawad for his systematic review entitled ‘Effectiveness of resilience training on the mental health of medical students and doctors’.
  • In 2015/16 to Tara Ludhra for her project ‘How do medical students perceive and apply the Bio-Psycho-Social (BPS) model?’ (supervisors: Kathy Kendall and Selma Omer)
  • To Devendra Rajwani for his project titled 'The Loss of Eden: Perceptions of refugee students at university', which was completed in the academic year 2014/15 (Supervisors: Kathy Kendall and Larry Day).

The prize is named in memory of Janis Schmedlin, a much loved and valued colleague who worked in the medical school for many years and contributed hugely to the high quality of undergraduate education.

What impact do intercalated degrees have?

Objectives:

  • Examine the role that intercalated degrees play within academic medicine.
  • Understand the impacts of these degrees on future academic performance, career choice and development of medical students.
  • Establish the broader context and history of intercalated degrees, i.e. how they developed over time to establish current trends. 

Do the marks awarded during the admissions process for medical school predict the students' performance?

Objectives:

  • Produce a literature review based on the various studies and journals which aimed to correlate a link between university selection procedures and performance in assessments throughout medical school.
  • Analyse the outcomes of these studies and determine which selection procedures are the most fair, accurate and ethical when it comes to deciding students who will be the potential doctors of the future.

An exploration of students' experiences of simulated patients within medical education - the BM5 Programme at Southampton Medical School.

Objectives:

  • What are the differences between the needs of different year groups regarding the use of simulated patients(SPs)?
  • Do students feel that the experience of SPs in teaching prepares them for real patient contact? How?
  • Do students find feedback from SPs useful / beneficial to their studies?
  • Overall, the project aspired to clarify student expectations and preferences as regards to SP teaching, investigate the nature of role play scenarios and understand the value of feedback.

Does a high mark from admission selection procedure (UCAS and UKCAT) predict good performance at medical school?

Objectives:

  • Examine the relationship between admission scores based on personal statements and performance in 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 5th year exams.
  • Examine temporal trends in this relationship.
  • Examine the relationship between the UKCAT marks and performance in 1st year exams.

Investigation into Student Attitudes on Admission at Southampton

Objectives:

  • Investigate how the students found this new process of taking the UKCAT exam
  • Investigate how students fill out their UCAS forms, with particular emphasis on personal statements.
  • Investigate into students choices behind why they choose Southampton Medical School.

A Questionnaire assessing the views, thoughts and feelings of both F1 doctors and nurse practitioners in respect to the competency of F1 doctors in the first two weeks of their clinical attachments.

Student: R Critchley, Supervisors: Mr. Baxter, Mr. Wijersinghe

Objectives:

  • Determine whether overall F1 preparation is sufficient.
  • Produce a set of guidelines in leaflet form for 5th years/F1 doctors.

Do BM6 Students Perceptions of Self, Influence Their Integration into the BM5 Student Cohort and Also Their Future Career Aspirations?

Objectives:

  • Investigate whether different perceptions of self facilitates integration of BM6 students into the BM5 student cohort.
  • Suggest recommendations to enhance future integration.
  • Investigate whether different perceptions of self influences career aspirations of BM6 students.

NHS Managerial Issues and Practices: How much should medical students know?

Objectives:

  • Identify the level of knowledge external stakeholders, such as the GMC, BMA, the royal colleges and clinical staff in general, feel graduating students require before practising medicine in F! posts.
  • Ascertain current student understanding of the management-medical interface.
  • Identify any knowledge gaps, if applicable, in order to inform future BM curricula.

Selectors View on Selection Procedures and Policy for The School of Medicine Southampton University

Objectives:

  • Look at the selection process from Selectors' point of view in an objective manner.
  • Investigate the eligibility and validity of Personal Statement (PS) and Referee Notes (RF) in UCAS form, according to the selector's opinion.
  • Assess selectors' opinion on UKCAT as an additional selection tool.

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