November 2nd, 2010 -
9:30 am - 10:30 am
Contextualized teaching: integrating medical/technical and communication skills
Veterinary work requires a diverse skill set: cognitive (e.g. knowledge, problem solving), behavioural (e.g. professional, empathy), communication and technical and the ability to integrate these skills is central to good clinical practice. However, students often find it difficult to combine skills especially when under pressure to make a decision or deal with an unexpected situation that arises. Several approaches to teaching 'combinations of skills in context' will be presented. These use safe, 'trial and error' learning environments (i.e. not on real patients) and complement existing communication skills role-play tutorials and technical skills stations in the clinical skills laboratory.
Bio ~ Dr. Sarah Baillie BVSc, PhD, MRCVS
Sarah Baillie graduated from the University of Bristol in the UK in 1986 with a Bachelor of Veterinary Science (BVSc) and an intercalated degree (BSc) in Anatomical Science. She spent 20 years working as a veterinarian in private practice. In 2001, while still working as a veterinarian, she undertook a Masters in Information Technology and then a PhD in the Department of Computing Science at the University of Glasgow. She joined the Royal Veterinary College, University of London in 2006 and now works full time as a Senior Lecturer in Veterinary Education.
As a veterinarian, she worked initially in mixed practice in the Cotswolds and then specialised in farm animal work gaining a Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS) Certificate in Cattle Health and Production (1992). After moving to central Scotland in 1994, she changed to small animal work and her main areas of interest were soft tissue surgery and business development.
While studying for her Masters, she started to develop a computer simulator, the Haptic Cow, for teaching veterinary students to perform bovine fertility examinations. During her PhD, she conducted research to validate the Haptic Cow as a teaching tool showing that students develop useful skills for examining live cows. She has also developed a haptic simulator for teaching equine colic examinations. New simulators are being developed that explore a more generic 'core skills' approach to palpation skill training with haptic games developed to help students improve their dexterity and perceptual skills, all of which are integral to many procedures. The haptic work is also being extended into the human medical field.
Sarah is also involved in: peer assisted learning projects; using role-play to contextualise clinical skills training; and professional studies - particularly in the area of business skills training for new graduates, interprofessional learning and extramural studies (EMS) or work-based learning. All these projects draw on Sarah's extensive experience in practice.
Recently, Sarah won the Times Higher Education's Most Innovative Teacher of the Year (2009). All universities in the UK were invited to nominate their most innovative teachers. This led to over 80 nominations. The 6 finalists attended the awards ceremony in London and, well, the rest is history!