This course will cover the basic aspects involved in being a medical writer. By the end of this course students will be able to develop critical and creative skills in the main categories of medical writing to build their competencies and provide them with the basic skills to work in the field of medical writing.

This course will be taught face to face in the second semester - running for 6 weeks.

A variety of teaching methods will be scheduled during each week including lectures, tutorials, workshops, and seminars.

There will be face to face lectures, an interactive seminar from a medical writer/editor and a workshop from the medical writing company.

The tutorials will take place to support the lectures, interactive seminar and workshop.

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■ Editing and peer review task - Scientific editing task; given a manuscript for editing and formatting (including figures and tables) - chose a scientific journal of their choice and follow the instructions for authors and make a paper from the information (30%). Peer review task - write a short critical review synopsis to decide if the manuscript should be published or not (30%) ILO 1 and ILO2. 

■ Medical communications - group task presentation. Students will be given a piece of scientific communication (primary manuscript) where they will be tasked with extracting the key information of the paper to produce a medical education slide deck or digital output for presentation to different stakeholders (patients/public/clinicians) (group work) (20%). ILO3.

■ Editorial/opinion piece to discuss diversity in clinical trials, patient engagement/recruitment, ethical and regulatory considerations, and the importance of lay summaries in manuscripts (1000 words - 20%). ILO4.

This course aims to enable students to:

■ Engage in assessment, editing, and revising of scientific writings.

■ Develop skills in medical/scientific writing to critically explore various methods of communication.

■ Provide students with the critical and technical skills to assess research integrity in published articles or articles being reviewed for publication.

■ Understand the ethical, legal and regulatory considerations in medical communications.

■ Build critical skills in giving feedback to their peers, tutors, and external stakeholders.

By the end of this course students will be able to:

1. Critically evaluate scientific literature to make informed judgment on the strength of the research article and where improvements/changes can be made in preparation for publication.

2. Critically evaluate medical communications to edit for appropriateness and compliance of scientific area, reference editing and table/figure editing in compliance with the publishing journals guidelines.

3. Critically assess a range of scientific communications and devise an appropriate digital method to disseminate the information in a different way to the original format, targeting varied audiences and stakeholders.

4. Critically assess scientific integrity, ethical and regulatory considerations when writing editorial communications that include patients and/or the general public.

Students must submit at least 75% by weight of the components (including examinations) of the course's summative assessment.