Department conducts lectures and Small Group Discussions under Professional Development and Family Medicine Strand during undergraduate training.
Lectures
Lectures are uploaded to the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) and face to face lecture time gives students the opportunity to clarify their problems.
Clinical appointment
The Family medicine appointment in the fourth year has four components:
- Training at the University Family Medicine Clinic
- Visits to general practice clinics on Saturdays
- Visit to outpatient department at Colombo North Teaching Hospital
- Visit a primary care hospital (divisional hospital or primary care department of a base hospital or a district general hospital)
During the training at the university family medicine clinic, students observe and learn the skills of conducting a general practice consultation and will be exposed to common primary care presentations, symptom analysis, problem-solving skills, and management strategies.
During the outpatient department (OPD) visit each student observes how a government sector OPD is functioning and should follow a patient from the time they enter the OPD till they leave to understand the process of care. This ensures that students will gain experience regarding patient registration, waiting time, consultation process and process of care provided at the OPD.
During the general practice visits, they collect demographic and morbidity data about three consecutive patients each. Collected data will be presented by the students at the end of the appointment seminar.
Students will be assessed by the end appointment examination and the marks carried to the unit 5 examination.
Making of educational videos with the aid of the audio visual unit in the faculty to teach undergraduates
- Introduction and Principles of Family Medicine
- Counseling
- Family dynamics and family in health and disease
- Practice organization and management
- Care of Elderly
- Consultation in family practice
- Patient management in family practice
- Breaking bad news and communicating in difficult situations
- Experience of health and common health beliefs
- Medical records in Family Medicine
- Referral letters prescriptions medical certificates
- Principles of doctor patient communication and basic communication skills
- Care of the dying patient and bereaved
- Health promotion disease prevention and lifestyle modifications
Small group discussions
- Communication skills
- Common health beliefs
Recommended Reading
- Oxford hand book of General Practice.
- Murtagh text book of general practice.
- NICE Guideline.
- Merck Manual professional
- https://patient.info/patientplus