Preliminary registration for our simulation-based courses:
Since these courses may not appear in Neptun by the time of the registration for elective courses, please indicate your intent for registration here:
https://forms.office.com/e/smgtJyDwgC
Please be informed that seats are limited, so the sooner you sign up, the more secure your seat will be. Furthermore, the registration of higher-year students is prioritized.
English Preparatory Course for the OSCE Doctor-Patient Communication
together with the Institute of Behavioural Sciences
- Recommended for 5th year students in the English Medicine programme.
- 2 credits, 90 minutes/week
- Schedule and location: weeks 1-14 XDay, Xtime-Xtime (soon), City Corner Skill Lab (3rd floor, Üllői út 25.) – 1st lesson: XDay (soon) September
This course equips international students with the English language proficiency needed to master the communication component of the OSCE exam through simulations. Students will practice all essential English language skills required for effective doctor-patient communication across all relevant OSCE scenarios. The course is held in cooperation between a language instructor and a communication expert, allowing for both linguistic and communicative supervision.
By the end of the course, participants will be proficient in conducting conversations using the NURSE, SPIKES, SBAR, CALM, and Calgary-Cambridge frameworks. Scenarios will cover intercultural, social, psychiatric, palliative, and critical care contexts, enhancing linguistic strategies for rapport building, compliance, and shared decision-making.
Syllabus:
week 1. English-language skills related to establishing rapport and funnel-style history-taking (e.g. using understandable medical language, paraphrasing patients’ words to demonstrate understanding, and appropriate use of modal verbs to sound polite and non-judgmental).
week 2. Linguistic strategies for formulating anamnestic questions to gather diagnostically relevant information with empathy. (e.g. the use of connectors to express the logic of the discourse, correct and context-appropriate tense and mode use, and phrases for back-channelling)
week 3. English language means of explaining diagnostic procedures and examinations. (e.g., lexical simplification, use of passive voice for objectivity, phrases for sequencing and signposting, cause-effect and purpose linking)
week 4. Linguistic strategies of empathetic diagnostic disclosure. (e.g., use of modality to express uncertainty or possibility, language for emotional alignment, and sentence starters for sequencing information)
week 5. English-language strategies to support patient compliance. (e.g., simplified, action-oriented instructions, reformulation with the teach-back technique, use of modals and softeners for recommendations, linking advice to patient values using causal connectors, chunking complex information
week 6. English-language skills for delivering bad news. (e.g., pre-warning/announcement language phrases, hedging)
week 7. English skills for persuading patients to make lifestyle changes. (e.g., the use of indirect suggestions and modals, conditional phrasing, use of intensifiers, and cause-and-effect language)
weeks 8-12. Simulation-based practice.
week 13. Oral test: simulation.
week 14. Evaluation.
Requirements:
– 75% attendance
– writing a professional reflection on a case (week 7) – 50% of the final grade
– an oral test with a simulated patient (week 14) – 50% of the final grade