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TRANSCRIPT
WRITTEN COMMUNICATION SKILLS
(WCS)- METHODOLOGY AND
ASSESSMENT
Dr. Saeed Farooq
PhD, MCPS(Psych), FCPS(Psych)
Professor Department of Psychiatry
PGMI, Peshawar ,
&
Visiting Professor Staffordshire University,
UK.
Communication skills: A core
competency Communication skills are one of the core
competencies in medical education recognised by
GMC, UK and Accreditation Council for Medical
Education Council, US.
Almost all training programmes now have
mandatory communication skills like FCPS training
programme.
WCS not part of communication
skills??
How many programmes have written communication skills as part of the training?
Very little formal training
In a review, only 15 of 101 medical schools in US offered formal writing courses
Bjork and Oye. Writing courses in American medical schools. J Med Edu, 1983, 58, 112-116
Assessment of WCS
The ECFMG Clinical Skills Assessment (CSA)assesses Patient Note (PN)exercise after a 15 min interview with standardised patient.
Specifically used to assess candidates’ ability to summarize and synthesize the data. About 75000 patient notes are reviewed and assessed by physicians anually.
Boulet et al found this to have adequate psychometric properties.
Bouelt et al, 2004 . Adv Health Sci Educ Theory Prac. 9(1),47-60
Where Written Communication Skills
are needed?
Patients & Carer
Professionals and Colleagues
Instructions/advice
Educational materials
Written Communication skills
(WCS) – Clinical settings
Prescriptions-pharmacists
Letters to GP
History
Professional reports
Requests for opinion/ calls
Written Communication skills (WCS) –
Management and administration
Clear written communication is essence of
administration and leadership.
Business plans, PC 1
Memos
Proposals
Reports: disciplinary and expert briefings
Written Communication skills (WCS) –
Education & Training
Essay questions
Dissertations/thesis
Scientific Articles
Reviews
Other forms
Problems with written
communication skills at present
Increasing emphasis on just recall, little analysis or
application
MCQS, EMQS, SEQs
Little informal and continuing assessments which
includes essays or assignments requiring scientific
writing
Problems with written
communication skills at present
Too much emphasis on curriculum
Lack of general reading and reproduce
Lacking or inadequate incentives and assessment
Assessment of content, rather form of expression, if any assessment.
Problems in Non English speaking
countries
Medium of Instruction in Education: English but no or poor training in written English for scientific training
Too much emphasis on formal rules and grammar rather than expression
A challenge for you - WCS of
different nature
Can you decipher this:
My smmr hols wr CWOT
I wntd 2 go hm ASAP, 2C my M8s again
Source: http://EzineArticles.com/5812010
What needs to be done
WCS must become part of curriculum
Emphasis in assessment on expression, form and
quality of communication
Improve vocabulary, encourage written
communication skills as part of communication skills
An example of written
communication skills: Scientific
writing module in MHR, KMU
Scientific writing module in MHR
Methodology and Contents
Assessment
Feedback from students
Methodology and Contents
Covers whole of scientific writing from case reports
to systematic review.
Small group presentations, lectures on qualities of
good scientific writings and English
Group work and hands on rewriting the different
sections of already published papers.
Feedback on students’ writings
The ABC of the course:
Characteristics of good scientific
writing
Accurate, Authentic
Brief, Bold
Clear, concise
Methodology
Lectures on scientific English and consents of a
scientific paper.
Four groups given one paper and asked to identify
the strong and weak points.
Each group then asked to rewrite a different section
of the article in the light of instructions given in the
lectures.
Group presentation of the rewritten section
Assessment
Assessment of the group work.
MCQs and SEQs on the written communication skills
and the published papers.
Feedback
Excellent feedback from students
The final assessment covered all the course that was
taught to us!
Conclusion
WCS is essential part of medical training,
especially in non English speaking countries.
Poor training in WCS may be one of the major
reasons for poor scientific outputs from these
countries
WCS is badly neglected aspect of communication
skills, and medical curricula in general
Conclusions
The present assessments and evaluation methods
completely overlook the WCS, made worse by
evaluation methodologies such MCQs
It is possible to develop the course contents and
evaluation methods for WCS, as demonstrated by
our successful experience in the MHR module
