By Dr Chris Stephens
Medical students have been getting a unique insight into hospital life through a new initiative. BM Years 5 and 6 and EU students will be undertaking shifts as health care assistants as part of their Medicine In Practice module in year 2. This has been made possible by collaborative working with the UHS NHS Trust, supported by Health Education Wessex. Our students will work several shifts in a variety of clinical settings, experiencing interprofessional working, and learning to interact with patients and carers in the wards before having to do this while also learning to make diagnoses and examine patients. We ran a small scale pilot of this placement successfully early last year, a larger scale pilot is currently underway, ahead of October 2014 when all students will take part in the scheme.
Another key change in the new curriculum is the move of the research project from year 4 to year 3. This means that in 2015-6 we will need double the usual number of projects as we accommodate an old year 4 alongside a new year 3. If you have not previously supervised students, we would be delighted if you would consider doing so. The work can be research or audit, and full training will be available to you as a new supervisor. If you are interested please contact Dr Susan Wilson on
S.J.Wilson@soton.ac.uk
.
The selection process for new medical students has changed from October 2014. All applicants will have to take the UK Clinical Aptitude Test (UKCAT). Applicants to BM4 and BM5 programmes will need to score a mark of at least 2,500 (from the first four subtests, excluding Situational Judgement) to be considered. We will then rank potential students by their UKCAT score and a certain percentage will be invited to a selection day, which will include an interview and group task. Applicants to BM6 must also take the UKCAT but there is no cut-off score for this programme. So far we have had very positive feedback from applicants and selectors on the process.