Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery (Graduate Entry)

The first two years of the course are structured around Problem-Based Learning (PBL). This is backed up by a small number of lectures. There will also be structured clinical skills teaching and anatomical skills teaching. Teaching in the Professional Competencies takes the form of lectures, tutorials, workshops and seminars on topics such as psychology, public health, health law & ethics and medical sociology. All sessions are focused towards the topic of the week and exploring it from different perspectives including the scientific, sociological, public health, legal and patient experience. This means that everything you learn is done in the context in which you will use it when you practise as a doctor.

In each of the first two years, the curriculum is further divided into six learning units, covering different topic areas. Areas covered by each unit include:

• Life Structure: Musculoskeletal system, Rheumatology, Orthopaedics, Trauma, Plastic Surgery, Skin & Dermatology
• Life Cycle: Reproduction & Development, Child Health (Paediatrics), Obstetrics & Gynaecology, Sexual Health, Ageing, Death
• Life Maintenance: Alimentary System, Gastroenterology, Endocrinology, Renal Medicine, Urology, Nutrition
• Life Protection: Immunology, Infection, Haematology, Oncology, Preventative Medicine, Genito- Urinary Medicine
• Life Support: Cardiology/ Cardiovascular Surgery, Respiratory Medicine, ENT
• Life Control: Nervous system, Neurology/ Neurosurgery, Vision & Ophthalmology, Psychiatry, Psychology

In Year 3, all students will be located in the General Practice/Primary Care setting in one of six Primary Care teaching Networks (PCTNs) for 18 weeks. For the remainder of Year 3, students will undergo hospital-based clinical training in Medicine and Surgery. Three weeks in Year 3 is devoted to the SSM.

In Year 4, students will spend 6 weeks of Clinical Training in each of Obsetrics/Gynaecology, Paediatrics and Psychiatry. They will also undertake another 6 weeks in Medicine & Related Specialties and a further 6 weeks in Surgery & Related Specialties. This will involve rotations through a number of affiliated hospitals. 6 weeks in Year 4 is devoted to the SSM. Students that are placed in the University Hospital Limerick (UHL) group for their Year 3 Medicine and Surgery rotations must complete theor senior cycle of Medicine and Surgery rotations in an affiliated hospital in Year 4 or vice versa. 

The ‘problems’ are highly structured hypothetical clinical cases, each of which takes a week to work through. Each semester, students are divided into groups of seven or eight, each with its own tutor in a tutorial room, with PC, state of the art AV equipment and walls lined with whiteboards. The group meets with the tutor to work through the week’s case. The tutor does not act as a teacher, but as a facilitator, guiding your group through the sequence of steps which have been devised to help students learn from the clinical cases. Each step and new development in the case (such as results of investigations or details of drugs prescribed) is only given out after the group has finished discussing the previous step.

By working through the problem and hypothesising about what is wrong with the patient, the PBL group comes up with a list of learning issues that represent the key knowledge needed to understand what is happening to the patient. The group members then independently research these learning issues (also known as learning objectives) in their own time. At the next PBL tutorial, each group discusses what they have learned and the tutor distributes the next stage of the problem. The new information is discussed, new learning issues arrived at, and members again research independently. The group report back again and the final stage of the problem is explored and the case concluded. By this time, the group is likely to have worked through:

• The original presentation of the patient (either at A&E, an outpatient clinic or a GP clinic)
• The history taken by the doctor
• The examination findings
• Any investigations ordered and their findings (e.g. Blood results, x-rays, biopsies, etc)
• The course of the patient's illness (over hours, days, weeks, months or years) and the impact of this on the patient's life
• Treatment (pharmacological, surgical, psychiatric, etc)
• The involvement of family & others close to the patient
• Any complications that might have arisen
• The outcome of the case (including rehabilitation, on-going community care, etc.)

Independent learning times are not just about reading from textbooks. During these times, you are encouraged to visit and make use of the facilities of the Anatomical Skills Education Unit and Clinical Skills Education Unit. Staff will be on hand to provide support in whatever area you feel you need it. However, to a large extent, students in the programme will be both encouraged and expected to assume a high level of responsibility for their own learning. Students will not be ‘spoon fed’ and there is a deliberate strategy to minimise the amount of didactic teaching in the curriculum.

During the first two years, The Early Patient Contact Programme at UL- GEMS gives students an opportunity to interact with patients. In the first semester, students in groups of three are assigned a patient from an affiliated general practice. The majority of patients assigned to students in the programme have a chronic illness e.g. Diabetes, Cystic Fibrosis, Multiple Sclerosis and many have multiple illnesses. Some students may be assigned an expectant mother where they will monitor her progress during pregnancy and subsequently the early development of her child. Over the course of the following 24 months, students will get to know their patient as a person and how their illness and their illness experiences have affected their lives.

Students will be expected to interact with their patient in a variety of different settings e.g. the patient’s home, in the patient’s GP’s surgery and at their hospital clinic appointments. They may even accompany their patients to the operating theatre if they need surgery. The early patient contact programme helps students understand both health and illness and how each are managed from a patient’s perspective. The programme will also help students to appreciate the strengths and deficiencies of the health services and provide them with some insight into the relationships between providers and consumers of healthcare. Finally, the experiences students get on the early patient contact programme will assist them in their learning of their classroom-based subjects in particular Special Study Modules (SSMs) allow students to study in-depth areas that are of particular interest to them. In total, students undertake three SSMs, one in each of Years 2, 3 and 4. Students have a considerable choice over the subject of these projects, but the format for assessment is prescribed. Some students might choose to undertake their SSM locally and others may go abroad to complete these electives.

Special Study Modules (Electives) allow students to study in-depth areas that are of particular interest to them. In total, students undertake three SSMs, one in each of Years 2, 3 and 4. Students have a considerable choice over the subject of these projects, but the format for assessment is prescribed. Some students might choose to undertake their SSM locally and others may go abroad to complete these electives.