Using JLA PSP priorities to train future doctors

Professor Jackie Cassell, Director of Research and Knowledge Exchange at Brighton and Sussex Medical School, spoke to the JLA about how the school has used PSP priorities for a number of years to provide real-life research questions to help educate future doctors about research methods.

Research methods education is embedded throughout the five-year medicine degree course, with the aim that Brighton and Sussex Medical School graduates become active users and producers of research in their future clinical careers. The research methods education they receive gives them a good grounding in the main types of research design, the role of systematic reviews in decision making, and how to assess the quality of research evidence available.

In year 3 of the course, students are required to complete a research methods essay. For the most recent students completing this, Jackie chose 50 research priorities from the Top 10s listed on the JLA website. These are real uncertainties that have been identified and prioritised by patients, carers and health and social care professionals working together. Students were asked to choose a priority research question and consider in 2,000 words how it could be answered using some of the most common research study designs. They wrote an introduction and a protocol for their work, and ended by writing a recommendation about what the best type of study design to answer that question would be.

This essay in year 3 prepares students for their work in year 4, when they collaborate with a member of the faculty of medicine to conduct an individual research project, developing a hypothesis, designing the methodology, collecting and analysing data, and completing a written report.