Clinical Hours for Students

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Hi

Does anyone know how many clinical hours you have to complete whilst studying?

Thanks

 

Re: Clinical Hours Student

When i was there it was 1000

Robert

 

Re: Clinical Hours Student

I would reckon I spent about 900-1000 clinical hours in my 3 years, but that was some years ago. Well, mid 90s.

 

Re: Clinical Hours Student

I am currently in my 3rd year and will have done approx 1000 hours on placement. Hope this helps.
Wendy

 

Re: Clinical Hours Student

The trouble with the current Australian Competancy Standards is that they explain the competancy, but not how you measure if it has been achieved. ie: there are no performance indicators associated with them, that is why the 1000hrs persists as it has produced gradutes of a safe standard over many years, but I do agree with admin that some people will require more or less time to reach the standard, and it would be better to measure performance against a standard rather than time. unfortunately the development of PIs takes time and money to develop, but with Universities changing the way that courses are delivered it is likely that the 1000hrs will decrease so it will be necessary for registering bodies to develop better ways of measuring competency otherwise a pre registration period after graduation may be required to reach the 1000hrs.

just my thoughts

 

Re: Clinical Hours Student

UKPOD123

>Does anyone know how many clinical hours you have to complete whilst studying?

1000 hours is a guideline not an absolute. Depending on what is written within the course document will determine your contract with the university.

To reinforce what Admin has written, the 1000 hours was a professional guideline in the pre degree era and constituted a 1000 hour clinical supervision. (apprentice). The concept fell from favour with curriculum builders when podiatry became a degree course. The intention was clinical education (at a cognitive level) would reduce the need for serendipitous practice. However little real advancement took place in the educational centres and when the spectre of clinical placements was mooted (in the UK) based on Blair's desire to use the NHS, protectionists reintroduced the 1000 clinical practice hours. Universities were more than happy to adopt this model since the provision for practical training fell to outside agencies with no financial cost to them.

Effectively from the turn of the century (in the UK) there was a return to block release apprentice.

I have long argued podiatry should be a three year Bachelor of Podology with a two year clinical masters (1000 hours), but as an educator and course builder I have always taken the 1000 hours liberally and included lectures, tutorials, demonstrations and practice, as well as actual supervised practice and reflection. That makes it much easier to work into an over stuffed program and keeps it neatly together as a stream, developing both horizontally and vertically.

I suppose that is the perspective of what is taught, but what students learn is quite a different kettle of fish and a course with 1000 hours of clinical studies written into the curriculum would be considered adequate time to prepare most graduates to take up their first position as a practitioner.

Another aspect is how students are assessed, if the assessment is set to agreed criteria and based on competence achievement then there should be room for negotiation with the student to lessen the number of hours if they can achieve the objectives and maintain them. This appeals to the motivated
but few programs offer this facility. If the program is based on a time served assessment (which most are), this is an apprenticeship. My observations over the years are, these clinical education programs are frequently ill defined but none the less easier to implement by institutions. Students and staff get bored with them and the potential for negative learning is very high. For several years I worked as a consultant with several universities who had implemented new degree programs and found problems with running a vocational degree.

Norm referenced assessment is inappropriate to test practical skills but competence based assessment has far greater potential with employer profiling a good way to go when students are on placement. This leaves cognitive assessment to the academics and practical problem solving to the clinical professionals. There are some examples of how this can work well but the vast majority of centres across the world are light years away from this. No ones fault and the teaching work load is heavy with few centres willing or able to experiment. The absence of suitable role models or forum for podiatric education has definitely stifled development although interested to note at the next FIP conference there will be a section on podiatric education. (Well done and long overdue).


Cheers
Cameron

 

Re: Clinical Hours Student

Stephen

>it would be better to measure performance against a standard rather than time.

To be fair to the standard setters, PIs are more the perogative of assessors albeit they may be done by the same body. That fine line aside, I do agree PIs would be very helpful in program writing.

> Universities (are) changing the way that courses are delivered it is likely that the 1000hrs will decrease.

The problem as I see it is Universities are merely following trends which may have no benefit to podiatry whatsoever. I agree with you these changes may force change upon professions and switch emphasis onto Registration bodies, forcing them to do more to ensure competence in their membership.

>so it will be necessary for registering bodies to develop better ways of measuring competency

Now critical mass counts and sadly at the present time there is insufficient workforce to provide uniform internship across Australasia as a prerequisite to registration. One comparatively easy way to overcome this issue however would be to set professional clinical examinations which were overseen by the profession bodies. Rather like the old UK system professional examiners and inspectors undertook clinical examinations at the end of critical blocks. This would certainly free up the academics to get on with research and consultancy and give the profession much greater say in students progress.

An interesting post note (if not a worry) is historically when competence exams were first complied in Australia for overseas pods coming into the country, they put the test out to pilot it and a random number selection of established practitioners took part. Over 60% failed.

Cheers
Cameron