Zeshan U. Qureshi

Centrally organised bedside teaching led by junior doctors

Background:  Clinical bedside teaching is arguably the most favoured form of teaching by medical students, but has been on the decline in recent years. Junior doctors are often underused as teachers and, with adequate training, may help to solve this problem. Bedside Teachers is a junior doctor‐led teaching programme that is delivered throughout South‐East Scotland, and is now in its third year. This study aimed to investigate the perceptions of final‐year medical students participating in the Bedside Teachers programme, and how they compared this with teaching from senior staff.

Developing junior doctor-delivered teaching

Background:  There are increasing opportunities for junior doctors to deliver teaching as well as formally develop teaching skills. Near‐peer teaching (NPT) programmes, like that established in South‐East Scotland, not only provide additional learning opportunities for students but also have potential benefits for the teachers.

Perceived tutor benefits of teaching near peers: insights from two near peer teaching programmes in South East Scotland:

Background and aims There is little evidence about the benefits to junior doctors of participating in teaching, or how to train doctors as teachers. We explore (through South East Scotland based teaching programmes): (a) How prepared do junior doctors feel to teach? (b) What junior doctors consider to be the main challenges of teaching? (c) What motivates the junior doctors to continue teaching, and what is the perceived impact of teaching on their professional development? Methods and results ‘Questionnaire 1’, distributed at ‘tutor training days’, explored (i) attitudes towards teaching and (ii) tutors’ preparedness to teach. ‘Questionnaire 2’, distributed after completion of a teaching programme, evaluated the tutor experience of teaching. Results Seventy-six per cent of tutors reported no previous teacher training; 10% were able to teach during allocated work hours. The strongest motivation for teaching was to help students with their learning and to develop teaching skills. Ninety one per cent of tutors felt more prepared to teach by the end of the programme. Tutors also improved their clinical skills from teaching. Conclusions There is a body of junior doctors, who see teaching as an important part of their career, developing both teaching and clinical skills in the tutor. If teaching is expected of foundation doctors, rotas ought to be more flexible to facilitate both teaching and teacher training.

Perceived tutor benefits of teaching near peers: Insights from two near peer teaching programmes in South East Scotland

It has been hypothesized that there is a close link between medical practice outcomes and creativity (Weisz & Albury 2010). At Tulane, we are interested in fostering student creativity to solve problems with a goal of developing technologies for market. We therefore initiated a medical student business proposal competition for our students, the first of its kind in a medical school. Our competition was designed to increase students’ appreciation of technology commercialization, inspire creativity, and to increase recruitment of future medical students interested in technology. To generate interest and provide instruction for our business proposal competition, we created a series of six, two-hour seminars that were held on a biweekly basis prior to the submission deadline. Participants included medical school faculty, business school faculty, law school faculty, staff from our Office of Technology Transfer, and successful entrepreneurs. During the first year, 16 proposals were submitted. Of the 16, seven were in the category of Educational Material and Software, two were Pharmaceuticals, and seven were considered Medical Devices. The winning submission was a portable water container that uses sunlight to sterilize its contents. The student with the winning submission has already established a limited liability company, has identified several business partners, and is attempting to secure grant and private investor funding. She also submitted her proposal to a national business plan competition and was one of the three finalists. Social entrepreneurship was first discussed in the 1960s to describe businesses that aspired to create social change rather than just profits for distribution to shareholders. As such, social entrepreneurs attempt to satisfy all of business’ stakeholders including shareholders, the public, the environment, and the community. Healthcare, as a business, is a prime example of social entrepreneurship. It has been implied that medical students by their very nature are socially conscious (Kumagai & Lypson 2009) ML. We suggest that our competition harnessed the social consciousness of participating students in order to foster the development of new ideas that could potentially improve society at large. Additionally, we suggest that a business proposal competition for medical students creates a nurturing environment for entrepreneurship that may lead to future dividends in the form of licensing and royalty income for the University.

Potential benefits of student- and junior doctor-led textbooks

IntroductionMedical textbooks are an important teaching supplement. Few have junior doctors or medical students (‘juniors’) as primary contributors. However, the strengths of junior-led face-to-face teaching are now well-established, and we hypothesized that similar advantages would be transferrable to a textbook setting.MethodsJuniors were approached to contribute to an independently published medical textbook, with senior clinicians recruited in parallel to ensure factual accuracy. Juniors directed every aspect of textbook writing and the production process. The published book stressed that it was an open collaboration with readers, inviting them to get in touch to evaluate the text and suggest ideas for new titles.ResultsOf 75 respondents, 93 % awarded the first textbook in the series 4 or 5 out of 5 for overall quality. Five other titles have been released, with seven more in development. Over 100 juniors are currently involved, with two students progressing from reviewers to editors after less than a year of mentorship.ConclusionJuniors can be a motivated, dynamic, innovative group, capable of significant contributions to the medical textbook literature. This initiative has generated a sustainable infrastructure to facilitate junior-led publishing, and has the capacity for expansion to accommodate new initiatives and ideas.