Teaching and Learning Professionalism: Lessons learned from the medical school experience

Abstract

Doctors, dentists, lawyers, teachers, business professionals are all expected to manifest professionalism, demonstrating attributes required for quality patient /client /student /customer care and service. Such professional attributes, including responsibility, honesty, respect, are expected to be acquired over the course of studies without necessarily being “taught,” but a quick look at newspaper headlines suggests that professional attitudes and behaviours in these professions could be further enhanced. A new longitudinal programme structured around early experiential learning in the Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine was recently initiated with the support of a Teaching Development Grant (TDG) to explore how the learning of professionalism might be made explicit in the undergraduate medical curriculum. The speakers will share their experience in developing the “Professionalism in Practice” programme and the lessons learned which may be relevant to other disciplines.