HOW TO DEVELOP A CORE CURRICULUM IN CLINICAL SKILLSFOR UNDERGRADUATE MEDICAL TEACHING IN THE SCHOOL OFMEDICAL SCIENCES AT UNIVERSITI SAINS MALAYSIA?

Clinical skills program as a laboratory method is a valuable adjunct to other formsof undergraduate medical training. This article describes the process of developinga core curriculum in clinical skills based on the Dundee model for a clinical skillscentre. The School of Medical Sciences, in Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) hasbeen provided with a well equipped skills centre. However, the PBL curriculum inthe undergraduate medical program in the school needs to be integrated with aclinical skills lab program. This is to counter the general feeling that the contributionof PBL is insignificant in terms of building clinical competency in an integratedsystem such as that used in USM compared to the traditional curriculi of othermedical teaching institutions in Malaysia. Integrating clinical skills laboratorytraining with the PBL curriculum will provide evidence of PBL as an effective andinnovative method for teaching and learning in Malaysia.