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"Before the course my knowledge in clinical research was like a pile of bricks stacked in a disorderly fashion. My feeling is that the course put good cement between the bricks and formed a solid and larger wall, which represents my current knowledge in this area.""The course was very well structured, covering since basics to advanced knowledge about many aspects of clinical research. Not only helped me to understand the technical aspects about researching, but also about working in group, discussing ethical and philosopical aspects. It required hard work and dedication, but it´s completely worthy! A life-experience opportunity!""Fascinating experience. The course is comprehensive, detailed, and provides the clinician with the basic knowledge and understanding of how to design and conduct a high level clinical trial.""The clinical trials course completely changed my view of clinical trials and research. It made it more accessible and clear and definitely helped in present and future research.""This course helped me to greatly enhance my skills in writing, reading, and reviewing a paper as well as give me the tools to better develop clinical trials."
Using Web 2.0 to Promote Clinical Research Training
We planned our international training program using the concepts of Web 2.0 as to enhance learning, communication and collaboration.
Our collaborative distance-learning training program is part of the Scholars in Clinical Science Program (Harvard Medical School) offered to participants from Boston and throughout the world. It is designed for individuals who wish to gain basic and advanced training in clinical trials before moving into the field and for those who have experience in this area and aim to broaden their role in the design, management, analysis, and reporting of clinical trials using innovative learning tools such as Wiki and web blogs.Collaborative Learning
Collaborative learning is an educational technique in which learners/students work together to solve a problem, complete a task or discuss an idea. This method is based on the notion that learning occurs naturally during social interactions; it occurs during the communication of learners.
In a collaborative learning setting, learners have the opportunity to discuss and engage with their peers as to defend their ideas, beliefs and questions; therefore helping with engagement and learning. An important concept is that learners benefit when exposed to diverse viewpoints from students with different background.→ read more...
Coimbra University Hospital and University of Minho (Coimbra and Braga, Portugal) are now sites for the Harvard Principles and Practice of Clinical Research course
In November, 2010, Dr. Monteiro and Dr. Breda from the Coimbra University Hospital and Dr. Goncalves from University of Minho announced they will now be a site of the Harvard Medical School Principles and Practice of Clinical Research course. These two centers hope to train the next generation of clinical researchers and also foster the participation of researchers in this large international network of clinical researchers that is prometed in this course. They are now enrolling students for the first class from Portugal in 2011. Dr. Fregni, director of the course, mentioned that "this will be a great collaboration for both sides. We look forward to have students from Portugal being part of this international training course in clinical research and work with them in our collaborative learning course."Course Director Prof. Fregni establishes a new partnership with Dean Chaves from PUCE (Quito, Ecuador)
The Course director Prof. Fregni visited the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador (PUCE) in Quito Ecuador. PUCE has major medical school in Ecuador. Dean Chaves and Prof. Fregni discussed the partnership between PPCR and PUCE as to have a site center in Quito Ecuador. "I was very impressed during my visit to PUCE. They have a major structure and outstanding students. In fact one of their students - Dr. Mauricio Villamar - is now at Harvard in my laboratory. We hope to have the first center in Quito next year and thanks to Dr. Chaves initiative, this may help to develop clinical research capacity at PUCE." says Prof. Fregni. The first class at PUCE should start in 2012.
Principles and Practice of Clinical Research
Our 6-month collaborative distance-learning basic course on clinical research covers the basics of clinical research (such as: how to formulate a research question, select study population, randomization and blinding methods) to statistical methods (data distribution and classification, statistical tests, sample size calculation, survival analysis, missing data and meta-analysis); data collection, monitoring and reporting (include training in manuscript writing); and study designs (observational studies, non-inferior and adaptive designs and randomized clinical trials).
This course starts in February 2011.→ read more...
"How Seven Principles of Teaching Can Transform Education"
In his book, "Making Learning Whole: How Seven Principle of Teaching Can Transform Education", David Perkins, Professor of Education at Harvard Graduate School of Education, discusses the seven principles of learning. According to this author, learning should be a natural process as, for instance, when we learn how to play baseball. In order to achieve this, we should learn by "wholes" instead of learning by elements or parts. For instance, when one is learning how to play a song, one sings the entire song. Therefore, according to this Harvard educator, there are seven learning principles: "1. Play the whole game; 2. Make the game worth playing; 3. Work on the hard parts; 4. Play out of town; 5. Uncover the hidden game; 6. Learn from the team...and the other teams; Learn the game of learning".
We also believe that learning by wholes is a more natural and therefore efficient process. In particular, the item 6 ("Learn from the team....and the other teams") is aligned with our basic educational method of collaborative learning. In fact, collaboration might make the principle by wholes possible.