Abstract

ABSTRACT: Special Study Modules (ÖÇM) are educational activities aiming to introduce the basics of scientific method and the ways to access the information, encourage students profoundly to learn and improve them in these matters. Subjects studied in SSM may show parallelism with the educational program, as well as being about topics concerning the social side of healthcare. The necessity of SSMs in medical education is stated in many guides, both national and worldwide. Since the academic year 1998-1999, SSMs are taking part of the first three years of training in Dokuz Eylul University School of Medicine. Students apply to subjects suggested by faculty members and are placed in one of the modules they’ve applied. Expectations from SSM differ by school years. Literature review in the first; research making or social responsibility projects in the second; literature review, social responsibility projects and research making studies in third years can be suggested. The SSM study presented in this article is a literature review, concerning how a physician delivers bad news to patients or their relatives. The manner a physician delivers bad news is at the utmost importance, since his attitude may directly influence patient’s future life or their feelings of the treatment. Therefore bad news should be broken in a special manner for each patient. Intentions of this SSM study are to raise first year students’ awareness about this issue, as well as improving their abilities in the matters of: accessing scientific content, interpretation of data, scientific text writing, presentation making, preparing a poster and article writing. Seven meetings with students and their educational director were scheduled according to the time allowed in the scholar program. While first sessions involved regulations of literature reviewing, quoting and obtaining resources, following ones included submissions of texts written by students, presentations and poster making on SSM. During all these steps, feedbacks given both by fellow students and by the faculty member to the students were truly enhancive and instructive. In addition, during the time in between sessions, feedbacks regarding the work of students were given by the faculty member. In this text, an elaborate

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